The future of thoracic surgery: articulated instruments

Thoracic surgery is living an enthusiastic era of thriving innovations. The changes in the fields of diagnostics, in the therapeutic options, the development of surgical techniques and the adoption of novel technologies has radically changed the horizons of our specialty. We must embrace the innovations, learn navigational bronchoscopy, understand the multiple targeted therapies, and learn new ways to operate on advanced cases. We will not be able to stay complacent with our current 3 ports video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) technique with open instruments, therefore every surgeon needs to be watching for each latest development as it happens. In this brief manuscript we will summarize some of the most important development over the recent years and forecast how this will impact on the patients affected by thoracic malignancies. As thoracic surgeons we have to embraces these developments in order to redefine our specialty.