• Surgeons are not specifically trained on the mechanisms by which monopolar instruments produce their clinical effects nor do they know their optimal use. Knowledge gaps remain common, and injuries are not rare.
• Knowing the differences between monopolar and bipolar instruments, and the basics of their application is key information that is necessary for the surgeon to understand how to develop and refine one’s surgical skills.
• Bipolar devices contain both the “poles” in the tip of the instrument, which focuses the energy delivered and reduces the energy required. This allows for electronic monitoring of tissue, with each manufacturer having a slightly different monitoring system.
• There are key advantages of the use of advanced bipolar energy, and how these devices and their effects are monitored is also important.
• Every surgeon must recognize the critical importance of ultrasound in the current and future practice of surgery. The majority of surgeons don’t have a minimum understanding of these technologies .

• Surgery by molecular energy is in our future, and knowing what is being studied and what surgeons can expect to be available for their use is crucial.

Being able to ask questions in a live setting can help us learn the latest and the future applications.

A New Kind of Surgery and Surgical Understanding
There is a science and an art to understanding electrosurgery. This involves the control of current density, that is defined as the amount of current per unit area of the electrode in contact with or near the tissue, and this is what allows the surgeon a more safe and versatile surgery.

There is much more basic education to cover, which will be accomplished during the session, but it is also vital to talk more about the future of energy medicine. This aspect of medicine should be incorporated within the curriculum of medical schools world wide, just as minimally invasive surgery was finally included in the 1990’s .

Molecular Energy
Scientists have long known that many forms of energy such as light and ultrasound can penetrate through tissues just as x-rays do (but without harmful radiation). By choosing the precise frequency and power of directed energy, it is possible to use it to make a diagnosis or to perform a surgery. This can be done seemingly instantaneously with a single instrument, at either the tissue, cellular or molecular level.

Directed Energy for Diagnosis or Therapy (DEDAT), as we now know it, was based on a concept conceived originally by Richard Feynman, who gave a famous talk on the topic in 1959 at Cal Tech to the American Physical Society. He inspired us to look to molecular energy to heal patients. Because patients are continually demanding progress, we believe that as strategies for using energy result in leading edge technologies, non-invasive surgery will eventually become a reality providing many powerful options in our tool belt as surgeons. During the MIS week session on energy, experts will be discussing how to present energy technology to scientists and surgeons in a way that summarizes its importance to the future of medicine.

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