How do medical robotics spread? The professional adventurousness of medicine’s coastal elites

• In Event: 20451 - Exciting New Medical Sociology that Everyone Should Know About

Abstract

How can we explain the diffusion of medical innovations that require extensive capital investments and multi-stakeholder buy-in? Because it involves extensive training and commitment, as well as potentially a professional risk, using robotics involves a kind of identity shift as much as it does a simple treatment decision. We use the case of the Stereotaxis surgical robot to identify key mechanisms in the spread of such advanced technologies. We draw on 16 years of data comprising 156 U.S. hospitals from 37 states, and 493 doctors. We find that hospitals using Stereotaxis are primarily concentrated in coastal regions of NY and CA, and to a lesser degree are located in the Great Lakes, Texas, and Florida regions. Because the decision to use robotics differs from one involving the use of a new pill, involving at times a shift in the professional identity of the physician, it may be unsurprising that the spatial spread of robotic technologies might follow patterns seen in the study of culturally-resonant objects. Indeed, the patterns of early bi-coastal adoption invite comparison with diffusion dynamics associated with subjects such as fashion.

Authors

• Zheng Fu, University of Arizona

• Daniel A. Menchik, University of Arizona