Surgical system providing automatic reconfiguration

A system for controlling a plurality of ophthalmic microsurgical instruments connected thereto, said microsurgical instruments for use by a user such as a surgeon in performing ophthalmic surgical procedures, said system comprising:

• a data communications bus;
• a user interface connected to the data communications bus, said user interface providing information to the user and receiving information from the user which information is representative of operating parameters of the microsurgical instruments;
• a surgical module connected to and controlling one of the microsurgical instruments as a function of at least one of the operating parameters, said surgical module being connected to the data communications bus;
• a central processor for executing routines to identify said module which may be in a plurality of different locations in a base unit and initialize the module communicating via the data communications bus;
• wherein the data communications bus provides communication of data representative of the operating parameters between the user interface and the surgical module.

A method for automatically reconfiguring an ophthalmic microsurgical system comprising:

• providing a data communications bus;
• connecting a user interface to the data communications bus;
• connecting a plurality of surgical modules for ophthalmic surgery to the data communications bus;
• connecting a central processor to the data communications bus, wherein the central processor executes routines to identify and initialize each of the modules that are communicating via the data communications bus and that are movable to a plurality of different locations in a base unit.