# Robotics Applications in the Hospital Domain:
## 6 Conclusions  
The demand for digital healthcare is increasingly evident due to the lack of human resources and the growing pressure on healthcare services. With current developments in robotics and AI and their application to healthcare systems, there is a clear need to make healthcare more resilient, efficient, and competitive. In this article, we examine robotic systems that can be adapted to a healthcare context. Supported by the latest literature on the subject, we investigate the challenges of integrating these systems, considering security and privacy issues, the risk of the dehumanization of healthcare, and the associated ethical and legal concerns. Additionally, our extended research project explores the challenges of deploying more intelligent and autonomous robotic systems in healthcare, such as STAR, partially automated Da Vinci, and VisAR.  
These systems, however, face their own challenges due to the limitations of technological maturity. Furthermore, our research involved a comprehensive examination of recent advancements in robotic systems, autonomous robotics, and their applications in the context of contemporary healthcare, with a focus on facilitating efficient, secure, and dependable integration.  
We analyzed the potential of robotic systems to enhance the efficiency of treatment, processes, and operations, including systems like PARO, UBBO, and Yomi. These technologies have the potential to revolutionize hospitals, addressing areas such as automation, multi-robot systems, intelligent decision-making, virtualization, and teleoperation.  
The integration of VR and AR with robotics is transforming healthcare delivery, particularly in teleoperation and telepresence. Robotics in the metaverse enables the merging of real and simulated data, facilitating augmented clinical trials and remote robotic surgery. Despite these advancements, non-technical issues also pose significant challenges. Financial barriers including the high costs of acquiring and maintaining robotic technologies are a major concern for healthcare providers. Liability issues arising from robotic errors and the need to protect patient privacy further complicate the adoption of these technologies. Moreover, psychological, social, ethical, and legal challenges must be addressed to ensure the responsible use of robots in clinical settings.  
Conceptualization, E.M.G.N.V.C. and S.O.; methodology, E.M.G.N.V.C. and A.C.; software, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; validation, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; formal analysis, E.M.G.N.V.C. and S.O.; investigation, E.M.G.N.V.C.; resources, E.M.G.N.V.C.; data curation, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; writing--original draft preparation, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; writing--review and editing, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; visualization, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; supervision, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; project administration, E.M.G.N.V.C., S.O. and A.C.; funding acquisition, A.C. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.  
This work was partially supported by Instituto de Telecomunicacoes, Lisboa, Portugal, and FCT/MCTES through national funds and, when applicable, co-funded EU funds under project UIDB/50008/2020.  
No new data were created.  
We would like to thank ISTCE-Instituto Universitario de Lisboa and IT-Instituto de Telecomunicacoes for providing the required resources to perform this research. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.