As surgical instruments and devices become increasingly advanced, they generate vast amounts of data in the operating room (OR). Effectively collecting, analyzing, and making this data readily accessible is crucial. Artificial Intelligence (AI) plays a pivotal role in harnessing this data, offering data-driven insights to improve surgical procedures, enhance decision-making for surgeons, and ultimately improve patient outcomes.

To meet this challenge, the Digital Surgery Lab is dedicated to the development of AI-driven algorithms for processing and analyzing data in the preoperative, intraoperative, and postoperative phases. This cutting-edge research leverages various sources of data, including endoscopic videos and data from surgical robots, while also monitoring the activities of both human surgical teams and technological components within an experimental OR environment.

The Digital Surgery Lab operates at the intersection of basic research and clinical application, with its leaders, Professor Beat Müller and Dr. Joël Lavanchy, actively practicing visceral surgeons at the University Digestive Health Care Center, Clarunis in Basel. They collaborate within the research ecosystem of DBE to expedite the development and testing of innovative solutions for their clinical work. 

"Optimizing surgical patient care through data science"

June 2025

• Two articles accepted at MICCAI 2025
• One article published in Medical Image Analysis
• Joël Lavanchy becomes a lecturer (Privatdozent) at the Medical Faculty of Basel University
• Jérôme Kurylec and Jan Liechti present their works at EAES 2025 in Belgrade, Serbia

May 2025

• Jan Liechti presents his work "Multimodal Machine Learning Models for Survival Prediction in Surgical Oncology", Joël Lavanchy gives an invited talk on AI and decision support for surgeons and Beat Müller gives an invited talk on new trends in surgical management of IPMN at SCS congress in Lausanne
• One article published in IJCARS

April 2025

• Two abstracts accepted as oral presentations at EAES 2025
• One abstract accepted at SCS 2025

March 2025

• Beat Müller gives an invited lecture on what we can expect from AI in abdominal surgery at Interregionales Chirurgenforum in Zurich
• Michael Moor, assistant professor for medical AI at ETH Zurich (D-BSSE) visits the Digital Surgery Lab
• Joël Lavanchy gives an invited talk on applications of AI in the operating room at Grand rounds of the Department of Anaesthesiology, Inselspital Bern

February 2025

• One article accepted at CVPR 2025
• One article accepted at IPCAI 2025

January 2025

• One article published in Surgical Endoscopy

November 2024

• Janis Neumann joins the Digital Surgery Lab as Data Scientist responsible for the AI Platform of Department of Surgery at the University Hospital Basel. Welcome!

Oktober 2024

• The Digital Surgery Lab receives project funding from the Vontobel Foundation
• Joël Lavanchy was invited to the panel discussion "Doctors of the Future" at the Swiss Medical Students' Convention in Basel
• On invitation of the Digital Surgery Lab Chinedu Nwoye, Postdoc at University of Strasbourg and IHU Strasbourg gives a talk on "Advancing Precision in Surgical Workflow Analysis through Detailed Tool-Tissue Interaction and Dynamic Tool Tracking" at DBE
• Joël Lavanchy served as general chair of CLINICCAI 2024 the clinician's day at MICCAI 2024 in Marrakesh, Morocco

September 2024

• Simon Pezold was honorably mentioned for outstanding reviews at MICCAI 2024
• Joël Lavanchy gives an invited talk on the applications of AI in the operating room at the OP-Management Symposium in Davos
• Simon Pezold successfully applied for a preparatory project at the Swiss National Supercomputing Center (CSCS) in Lugano
• Joël Lavanchy gives an invited talk on the role of AI in HPB surgery and receives the surgery prize at the SGG-SGVC-SASL congress in Interlaken

July 2024

• Joël Lavanchy gives a lecture about Tips & Tricks in Surgical Data Science at the Surgical Data Science Summer School in Strasbourg, France
• One article published in SOARD
• Jérôme Kurylec joins the Digital Surgery Lab as Clinician Scientist. Welcome!

Mai 2024

• The Digital Surgery Lab has several talks at the Swiss College of Surgeons Congress May 30/31 in Davos
• Jan Liechti and Jérôme Kurylec are supported by the Department of Surgery at the University Hospital Basel to conduct research projects at the Digital Surgery Lab. Congratulations!

April 2024

• One article published in IJCARS
• The Digital Surgery Lab is now available via digitalsurgerylab.ch

March 2024

• On behalf of Swiss-MIS Joël Lavanchy organized the Tripartite Meeting in Minimally Invasive Surgery March 7/8, 2024 in Basel. Beat Müller gave a fantastic lecture on Robotic Esophagectomy

February 2024

• Jan Liechti joins the Digital Surgery Lab as Clinician Scientist. Welcome!
• Simon Pezold joins the Digital Surgery Lab as Data Scientist. Welcome!

January 2024

• Julia Ruppel joins the Digital Surgery Lab as Data Manager. Welcome!
• Joël Lavanchy receives a Young Investigator grant from the Novartis Foundation for medical-biological Research

December 2023

• Joël Lavanchy co-chairs the Surgical Data Science session of the Surgical AI Day at Orsi in Ghent, Belgium
• Stefanie Speidel, Professor for Translational Surgical Oncology at the National Tumor Center in Dresden visits the DBE and the Digital Surgery Lab
• Beat Müller gives an invited lecture on the Role of Virtual Reality and AI in Colorectal Surgery at the European Colorectal Congress in St. Gallen

November 2023

• The Digital Surgery Lab is featured in the Schweizerische Ärztezeitung

October 2023

• Joël Lavanchy gives an invited lecture on Surgical Skill Assessment at the Department of Visceral and Thoracic Surgery, Kantonsspital Winterthur
• Joël Lavanchy serves as a program chair for the clinical day (CLINICCAI) at the International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention, MICCAI 2023

September 2023

• Nicolas Padoy, Professor of Computer Science at University of Strasbourg and Scientific Director of IHU Strasbourg visits the Digital Surgery Lab 
• Beat Müller presents on Pancreatic Cancer and Papillary Carcinoma and Joël Lavanchy on Video-Based Assessment of Laparoscopic Gastric Bypass at the Annual Meeting of the SGG, SGVC and SASL in Interlaken
• The Department of Surgery at University Hospital Basel assigns the project "Data driven surgery" to the Digital Surgery Lab

August 2023

• Beat Müller presents on Robotic Surgical Oncology and Joël Lavanchy on Improving Surgical Skill Assessment Using Robotics at the Medical Robotic Week / CURAC in Basel

July 2023

• The Digital Surgery Lab at the Department of Biomedical Engineering is founded
• Joël Lavanchy recieves a PostDocMobility return grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation
• Joël Lavanchy presents on How to Start a Surgical Data Science Project at the Surgical Data Science Summer School in Strasbourg, France