UI Health’s Leadership in Telesurgery is Leveraged to Expand Access to Surgical Care

Posted on July 21, 2026
A man wearing a suit and a man wearing a white blab coat, standing together in a bright room filled with robotic surgery equipment.
Dr. Enrico Benedetti and Dr. Stephen Bartlett in UIC's Surgical Innovation and Training Laboratory. (Photo: Jenny Fontaine/UIC)

UIC researchers are testing the limits of safe and effective telesurgery over great distances, with implications for both rural healthcare and care for military combat personnel. With the help of $9 million in funding from the Office of Naval Research, they are investigating the time lag introduced via telecommunications, which creates delays between the surgeon and the robotic surgical equipment. The team is specifically testing the amount of lag permissible while still delivering safe and effective surgical care.

Principal investigator Dr. Stephen Bartlett, a transplant surgeon at UI Health, observed that the real opportunity in telerobotics will be addressing the dearth of general surgeons in rural areas. “There’s a shortage in rural communities that was exacerbated during the COVID pandemic,” he said. “So telerobotics is a solution to the rural healthcare problem.”