Augmedics, a company specializing in augmented reality (AR) surgical navigation, has successfully treated 10,000 patients with the xvision Spine system. This marks a new record for use of AR navigation for spine surgery, the company said.

This milestone comes as the company begins U.S. commercial launch of its CT-Fluoro registration method. The move expands navigation access for spine surgeons and build on the flexibility of xvision’s open platform system.

The record-setting 10,000th case was performed by Dr. Isaac L. Moss, Chair of Orthopedic Surgery at UConn Health in Farmington, Conn. Moss and the UConn team started using Augmedics in May 2022, becoming the first in central Connecticut to offer AR navigated spine surgery.

Today, with six spine surgeons across the orthopedic and neurosurgery departments regularly utilizing xvision, it’s one of the largest AR programs in the country.

“Augmented reality navigation makes instrumentation of the spine, even complex revision or deformity, a low cognitive load task,” said Moss. “Meaning, you can achieve high levels of accuracy in complex situations with very little mental fatigue. This in turn allows surgeons to have greater focus during the potentially more complex parts of the procedure. While this can be achieved with traditional navigation, the ease of use and intuitive nature of the augmented reality system gives it a significant advantage over other platforms. As a result, we can do more complex cases with less invasive techniques on a regular basis and achieve optimal results for patients with likely less surgeon fatigue and burnout in the short and long run.”

“Since inception, Augmedics has been a company of firsts—the first FDA-cleared AR navigation system for surgery, the first augmented reality spine surgeries in US, the first AR clinical accuracy studies,” said Augmedics president and CEO Paul Ziegler. “With that, there has always been a high degree of interest in AR and its potential to improve the safety and efficacy of spine surgery. The milestone of 10,000 surgeries is not only a celebration of 10,000 patient lives impacted but furthers our belief we are fundamentally changing the surgical status quo. AR is here to stay.”