Definitions & Terminology

Aerospace Medicine is a field historically dedicated to keeping healthy individuals optimized in abnormal environments and relies on preventive medicine techniques.

Arizona Program for Exploration Medicine and Surgery (APEX) has partnered with the largest commercial space provider, SpaceX, to train physicians in fundamentals of traditional aerospace medicine, provide training in austere surgical care, and pursue multidisciplinary research in surgical topics.

Invasive Medicine is a medical procedure that breaks or penetrates the skin or a body cavity, such as an incision, perforation, or catheterization.

Remote Telesurgery utilizes robotic technology and wireless networking to connect patients and surgeons who are geographically distant.

Robotics and autonomous systems in healthcare focuses on technologies that allow local care providers to be assisted by medical robotics, either driven by conventional tele-operation from remote experts or driven by AI or closed-loop control. This area includes forward deployed telerobotic surgery, AI-driven robotic sensing, planning, and actuation, and semi-autonomous and remotely-managed care systems.

Robotic Surgery is surgery performed using mechanical arms controlled by a surgeon via a computer-assisted platform.

Space Medicine is a branch of aerospace medicine that focuses on the medical care of astronauts and spaceflight participants as well as the practice of preventative medicine in the extreme environment of space.

Space Surgery is a field that addresses treatment of traditional surgical diseases with integration of medical and invasive medical modalities in the context of the space travel platform.

Space Surgery Association is an international group of surgeons, anesthesiologists, procedural medicine physicians and specialists, scientists, and engineers actively working to jointly develop capabilities to perform surgery in the spaceflight environment. This organization serves as the hub of procedural exploration and integration of surgical research and technological advancements intended for the spaceflight environment, with groups such as the SAGES SSTF as spokes that help to support the larger mission.

SAGES Space Surgery Task Force is part of Society of American Gastrointestinal Endoscopic Surgeons that is a surgeon-led effort to improve the care of surgical diseases during space exploration and deliver lessons learned to benefit the care of patients in austere environments on Earth.

Tele-Mentoring: use of information technology to provide real-time guidance and technical assistance for surgical procedures from an expert physician at a different geographic location.

Tele-Presence: use of virtual reality technology, especially for remote control of equipment or for apparent participation in geographically different locations.