Neurosurgeons at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London have carried out the world’s first operation to remove a brain tumour using live artificial intelligence assistance, saving the patient’s eyesight in the process. The procedure was performed by consultant neurosurgeon Professor Hani Marcus alongside surgical resident Danyal Khan, part of a research team of Pakistani origin involved in developing and applying the technology during the operation.
Speaking about the surgery, Khan explained that the surgical team remained fully in control throughout the procedure, with the AI functioning as an on demand tool activated by the surgeons themselves. The system watches the operation in real time, seeing exactly what the surgeons see, and highlights on a separate screen the critical life sustaining and sight sustaining structures that must be identified and avoided while removing the tumour. Khan described the tool’s development as the result of nearly a decade of collaborative work between surgeons, engineers and designers before it was finally brought into the operating room.
What distinguishes this case as a world first is that the AI operated live during the procedure itself, running through a supercomputer built into the surgical camera stack, rather than relying on pre-operative scans analyzed beforehand. The system provides colour coded outlines of key anatomical structures in real time, a capability Khan said has only recently become possible due to advances in both AI models and computing power. Patient Rhys Hibbert, 48, from Bedfordshire, said the surgery had effectively saved his sight, since the tumour on his pituitary gland would otherwise have continued threatening his vision.
Khan said the underlying technology was first developed for general surgery, including gallbladder and bowel procedures, and has since been combined with robotics in related applications, including a similar AI assisted bowel resection performed in Japan earlier this year. The team has completed around ten cases so far and has paused the ongoing trial to update the model and refine its computing systems, with plans already underway for a larger trial at the same centre and eventually at other hospitals across the United Kingdom. The trial was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research and Google, with the AI system developed in-house at the UCL Hawkes Institute using footage from hundreds of previous brain surgeries.
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