  Purpose: Mutual acceptance is required for any human-to-human interaction.
Therefore, one would assume that this also holds for robot-patient
interactions. However, the medical robotic imaging field lacks research in the
area of acceptance. This work, therefore, aims at analyzing the influence of
robot-patient interactions on acceptance in an exemplary medical robotic
imaging system. Methods: We designed an interactive human-robot scenario,
including auditive and gestural cues, and compared this pipeline to a
non-interactive scenario. Both scenarios were evaluated through a questionnaire
to measure acceptance. Heart rate monitoring was also used to measure stress.
The impact of the interaction was quantified in the use case of robotic
ultrasound scanning of the neck. Results: We conducted the first user study on
patient acceptance of robotic ultrasound. Results show that verbal interactions
impacts trust more than gestural ones. Furthermore, through interaction, the
robot is perceived to be friendlier. The heart rate data indicates that
robot-patient interaction could reduce stress. Conclusion: Robot-patient
interactions are crucial for improving acceptance in medical robotic imaging
systems. While verbal interaction is most important, the preferred interaction
type and content are participant-dependent. Heart rate values indicate that
such interactions can also reduce stress. Overall, this initial work showed
that interactions improve patient acceptance in medical robotic imaging, and
other medical robot-patient systems can benefit from the design proposals to
enhance acceptance in interactive scenarios.
