Apple Vision Pro Used in World-First Cataract Surgery

[MacRumors]

Apple's Vision Pro has hit another medical-use milestone, with a New York ophthalmologist becoming the first surgeon to perform cataract surgery using the spatial computing headset.

Dr. Eric Rosenberg of SightMD completed the initial procedure in October 2025 and has since performed hundreds of additional cases using ScopeXR, a surgical platform he co-developed for Apple's mixed reality device.

ScopeXR streams live feeds from 3D digital surgical microscopes directly into the Vision Pro, which lets the surgeon view the operative field in stereoscopic 3D while overlaying preoperative diagnostic data. The platform also supports real-time remote collaboration, allowing surgeons to virtually join procedures and see exactly what the operating surgeon sees.

"We are now able to bring the world's best surgeon into any operating room, at any hour, from anywhere on the planet," said Dr. Rosenberg in a company press release. "From residents performing their first cases to surgeons facing unexpected complications, this technology democratizes access to expertise and that will save vision."

It's another example of Apple's move toward enterprise and professional use cases for Vision Pro, with widespread consumer adoption beleaguered by the headset's $3,499 starting price and bulky form factor. Apple has increasingly leaned into specialized applications in fields like medicine, aviation training, and industrial design - markets where the device's capabilities can justify its cost, in other words.

The headset was never expected to be mass-market from day one, according to Apple. Even so, enthusiasm is said to have cooled far faster than anticipated. Based on the latest reports, there are now no Apple Vision headsets in active development, with the company's focus pivoting to lightweight smart glasses, where Meta has already seen success. Last October, Apple introduced an updated Vision Pro model featuring the M5 chip, the first hardware revision of the device.

Article Link: Apple Vision Pro Used in World-First Cataract Surgery

 

[turbineseaplane]

Well, I'd say the doctor accomplished the goals here.

1. Get press coverage


.....
way way way down the list
....



37. Accomplish cataract surgery, a field for which things have been fully fleshed out for 30+ years.

(my father was an Ophthalmologist & cataract surgeon and one of the very first to bring LASIK to the US)

 

[PBG4 Dude]

Wow, “beleaguered”. Haven’t heard that term used in Apple reporting since the bad old days of the 90s.

 

[sw1tcher]

Apple's Vision Pro has hit another medical-use milestone, with a New York ophthalmologist becoming the first surgeon to perform cataract surgery using the spatial computing headset.

Vision doctor uses Vision Pro to improve patient's Vision.

I see what Dr. Eric Rosenberg is doing here. 😂

 

[gummybear2026]

Medical use milestone is a massive stretch on the Apple Vision Pro! The product is a massive failure.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Vision doctor uses Vision Pro to improve patient's Vision.

I see what Dr. Eric Rosenberg is doing here. 😂

Quite Visionary indeed!
An astute point.

 

[everlast3434]

What head strap did they use lol

 

[Kissmo1980]

would be funny if the cataract was produced by using a vision pro 😛

 

[contacos]

Our health care system may be "free" but this ain't happening with our penny pinching hospitals that care more about their shareholders than patients here.

My sister and my mum are both nurses and they just got rid of small local warehouse to save money and now they need to participate every Monday how many utilities they may require the following week to put in an order or one IV nurse is legally only supposed to take care of 3 patients for something and they are at 9 and they rather pay a fine than to hire more staff. Insane how fast everyone forgot about COVID and how important a functional health care system is.

 

[dannys1]

Quite impressive because sometimes i've taken 3 or 4 goes to put a 25 foot wide projector screen in the right place on it.

 

[HouseLannister]

And they were able to maintain creepy uncanny valley eye contact the whole time.

 

[DocMultimedia]

Medical work is one of the best real world uses for the AVP in my opinion. But like everything in medicine, it might take a bit of time for things to change.

 

[Agent007]

And, yet, still selling like ****. Take your lumps and shut up, Apple.

 

[innerproduct]

The Vision Pro is a nice product if they just dared to position it as a pro device and make it available worldwide. I want one but in my country it is not available even for development work which is very sad for those of use that creates SW that is global. Buying in a certified country have one jumping through hoops.There should of course also be first party "wands"/controllers for precision work as well.

Sad that all focus is on consumerism (not just Apple).

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Vision Pro uses Apple Vision Pro to restore Pro's Vision

===

Jokes aside, I am curious whether latency or resolution of the AVP... or maybe stuck pixels or any other display issue... risk a negative impact on the surgery that could be negated by... achieving passthrough some other way... ie, regular glasses.

 

[I7guy]

Medical use milestone is a massive stretch on the Apple Vision Pro! The product is a massive failure.

Yep. The surface hasn’t even been scratched, which is why the product is a success and doesn’t have to sell in iPhone like quantities.

 

[code-m]

He co-developed the app, it seems like a hubris shameless plug to promote his app.

One could possibly do remote surgery with a mobile phone, who wants to be the guinea pig. 😝

 

[Mousse]

Jeez. Folks dumping on the AVP because someone found a niche use for it. I'm a fan of reclamation projects, especially successful ones. I've said from the beginning that the AVP would be a great product for the scientific community if only someone would make the apps for it.

 

[code-m]

Yep. The surface hasn’t even been scratched, which is why the product is a success and doesn’t have to sell in iPhone like quantities.

AVP is not a device that one can slip into their pocket and take it anywhere and slip it out to use it at a moments notice. In its present form factor it’s nothing more than a hobby or proof-of-concept.

AVP deviates from Apple’s philosophy of having a device disappear while being useful, powerful and capable to the user.

 

[code-m]

Jeez. Folks dumping on the AVP because someone found a niche use for it. I'm a fan of reclamation projects, especially successful ones. I've said from the beginning that the AVP would be a great product for the scientific community if only someone would make the apps for it.

Wake me up when AVP looks like Star Treks Jordy headband vision thingy. 😎

 

[lepetitnicolas]

 

[Sill]

Wake me up when AVP looks like Star Treks Jordy headband vision thingy. 😎

Wake me up when its a pair of contact lenses.

AVP is not a device that one can slip into their pocket and take it anywhere and slip it out to use it at a moments notice. In its present form factor it’s nothing more than a hobby or proof-of-concept.

AVP deviates from Apple’s philosophy of having a device disappear while being useful, powerful and capable to the user.

Both are accurate statements. As the first device of its kind from Apple, it's more than a little reminiscent of the "Macintosh Portable". But look what that led to later on. We carry supercomputer-class devices now that weigh about 5 lbs and have days of standby power, gigabit net, and gorgeous UHD screens.

 

[gummybear2026]

Our health care system may be "free" but this ain't happening with our penny pinching hospitals that care more about their shareholders than patients here.

My sister and my mum are both nurses and they just got rid of small local warehouse to save money and now they need to participate every Monday how many utilities they may require the following week to put in an order or one IV nurse is legally only supposed to take care of 3 patients for something and they are at 9 and they rather pay a fine than to hire more staff. Insane how fast everyone forgot about COVID and how important a functional health care system is.

No health care system is free. There is massive trades off that the free health care system holds you hostage when you can have elective surgeries done.

 

[Sill]

Jeez. Folks dumping on the AVP because someone found a niche use for it. I'm a fan of reclamation projects, especially successful ones. I've said from the beginning that the AVP would be a great product for the scientific community if only someone would make the apps for it.

I'm old enough to remember a couple months ago when the FDA certified the Apple Studio Pro XDR for medical diagnostic imaging and the monkeys here wasted no time in flinging poo at it. "What a failure, what a niche use, hardly justifies having a cost almost 10 times higher than a Benq with the same specs!" As a person qualified in display calibration I immediately got the significance of the XDR and just how amazing it was that Apple packed all of that in a display.

It's like people are either so jaded that they expect everything to come out of Apple has to be a category-killer in order to be useful. Proof-of-concept is an alien idea, and halo products and use-cases are just fairy tales.

 

[WarmWinterHat]

Our health care system may be "free" but this ain't happening with our penny pinching hospitals that care more about their shareholders than patients here.

My sister and my mum are both nurses and they just got rid of small local warehouse to save money and now they need to participate every Monday how many utilities they may require the following week to put in an order or one IV nurse is legally only supposed to take care of 3 patients for something and they are at 9 and they rather pay a fine than to hire more staff. Insane how fast everyone forgot about COVID and how important a functional health care system is.

>50% of hospitals in the US are non-profit; the one I work for is (university teaching hospital), and we're penny pinching because we're barely breaking even, despite being the largest healthcare company in the state...all due to recent Medicare/Medicaid changes.

As for the article, well good the surgeon I guess. We trialed the AVP about a year ago in microsurgery and decided against it for a multitude of reasons but the main one, or so I heard, is that it doesn't fail to on..if something happens, the wearers world goes dark instead of passing video through. I don't work in IT, so can't verify, but we had eight AVPs for a few months..two for each room.

If this type of thing is what Apple pushed this towards, I would be more interested in it..but instead they pushed it as a "brand new way of computing" for the masses, instead of a useful tool for specific situations.