No ICU, No Drilling, No Staples, No Epidurals: How a Chandigarh Surgeon Is Rewriting the Rules of Knee Surgery in India

With his proprietary RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique, Dr. Tarandeep Singh Gill, Max Hospital Mohali, is aiming to solve the one problem that keeps thousands of Indians with knee arthritis away from successful treatment - the fear of knee replacement surgery and the hardships often associated with it.

MOHALI / CHANDIGARH TRICITY: India is estimated to have more than 15 crore people living with knee pain caused by arthritis - a number larger than the total population of many countries. Yet thousands of them never reach an operating room. Ask any senior orthopaedic surgeon why, and the answer is rarely about money or access. It is almost always fear: fear of the ICU, fear of an epidural injection in the back, fear of bones being drilled, and fear of months of painful physiotherapy after knee surgery.

This fear associated with knee replacement surgery was the fundamental reason that Dr. Tarandeep Singh Gill set out to overcome when he developed the proprietary RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique, an AI-enabled, Augmented Reality-assisted technology.

"The real risk isn't surgery. It's waiting too long," says Dr. Gill, who has performed thousands of successful knee resurfacing, joint replacement and sports injury surgeries in a career spanning more than 15 years, including advanced training in Germany and leading institutes in India.

"Every day I meet patients who have endured five, sometimes ten years of knee pain because someone told them that knee surgery means an ICU bed and a rod drilled through the thigh bone. With the RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique, none of that is true anymore."

AI Analysis & 3D Mapping of the Knee - Simple Yet Brilliant

At the core of the RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique is a deceptively simple idea: perform the knee surgery digitally before actually performing it in the operating theatre.

Before surgery, 3D Mapping technology creates a personalised three-dimensional blueprint of the patient's knee. During the procedure, Dr. Gill wears an Augmented Reality headset powered by Microsoft, which projects this 3D blueprint - including alignment axis, cutting planes and implant position - directly into his field of view with real-time AI guidance, helping improve surgical precision.

"The result is accurate implant positioning, precise limb alignment and a knee that feels more natural," Dr. Gill adds.

Such outcomes were achieved less consistently with conventional jig-based knee replacement surgery. Dr. Tarandeep Singh Gill highlights that "Instead of adding new features, it is what the technique eliminates from the overall knee surgery experience that is changing the patient's perspective about traditional knee replacement surgery."

Fear Factors Eliminated - A Patient's Perspective

• No Staying Alone in ICU
  Since the procedure is minimally invasive and bone-preserving, with reduced blood loss and shorter surgical time, patients are shifted to their private room after surgery, where a family member can stay with them for emotional support. Most patients are encouraged to stand and walk a few steps within hours of surgery.
• No Drilling into the Thigh Bone
  Conventional knee replacement involves inserting a long metal alignment rod through the marrow canal of the femur. To insert this rod, the thigh bone has to be drilled using a motorised instrument. The RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique uses digital AI alignment, eliminating this requirement - meaning no drilling, less bleeding, less post-operative pain and a lower risk of complications such as fat embolism.
• No Epidural Injection in the Back
  Modern multimodal short-acting anaesthesia protocols allow patients to avoid the painful epidural injection, along with prolonged numbness of the lower limbs for 24-48 hours that can delay mobilisation.
• No Metal Staples
  Wounds are closed using advanced cosmetic techniques with self-dissolving sutures and surgical glue, eliminating the discomfort of staple removal.
• CR (Cruciate Retaining) Implants - Bone Preserving by Design
  Rather than removing large sections of healthy bone, as in conventional total knee replacement using PS implants, the RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique removes only the damaged cartilage and bone, resurfacing them with smaller CR implants while preserving healthy bone and ligaments and keeping future treatment options open.
• Faster Recovery
  Patients report returning to morning walks, climbing stairs and resuming family routines significantly sooner than after conventional surgery. Faster recovery enables patients to enjoy a more active lifestyle.

Patients Travelling to Chandigarh from Across India

The approach is drawing patients from well beyond Punjab and the Tricity. Dr. Gill's wards at Max Mohali now routinely receive patients from Kolkata, Delhi, Mumbai and several other states, many of them elderly men and women who had resigned themselves to a life indoors.

Among them is Satya Prakash from Noida, who underwent AI-enabled RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing surgery after years of pain.

"After all these years, I can finally walk without discomfort," he says. "Dr. Gill and his entire team gave me my confidence back. I thank them from the bottom of my heart."

Stories like his - grandparents lifting their grandchildren again, morning walkers returning to their routes and retirees planning family trips - have become the most persuasive endorsement of the technique, spreading largely through word of mouth from what the hospital's corridors have come to call its "Happy Patients."

About Dr. Tarandeep Singh Gill

Dr. Tarandeep Singh Gill is Director - Orthopaedics & Joint Replacement at Max Super Speciality Hospital, Mohali (Chandigarh Tricity), and the Founder and Pioneer of the RoboLens FT-3D Knee Resurfacing Technique. Trained in advanced joint replacement in Germany and India, he has over 15 years of experience and thousands of successful surgeries to his credit.

For Appointments:
+91 62395 89197 | +91 82880 15106 | +91 73476 37838

Location:
Max Super Speciality Hospital, Mohali, Chandigarh Tricity

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