Surgery by robotic arm

HYDERABAD: Prostate cancer is the second leading cause of death in men. To bring in accuracy and efficiency in the procedure of malignant prostate removal, da Vinci surgical system has been used to perform the surgery through robotic arms. Developed by the Henry Ford Vattikuti Urology Institute (VUI) based in USA, this method was demonstrated for the first at time at KIMS at Secunderabad by Dr. Mani Menon, Director of VUI at Detroit.Through the robotic arm, upto six-times of magnification can be achieved which helps in increasing the precision of the surgery. “The better a surgeon sees, the better he does,” said Dr. Bhandari who is one of the group members of urologists who have performed the robot-assisted operations at USA.An extension of the surgeon’s arms at a 5 mm precision. The incision required for the procedure is of the order of 1 to 2 centimetres and the bleeding is reduced, claim the developers. The pressure for incision is optimized such that the pressure exerted by the surgeon’s hands is transmitted at a force compatible to the tissue. So far, 10,000 robotic prostatectomies have been performed at KIMS with zero mortality.The procedure costs around $70,000 dollars in USA and it translates to a capital of `1.5 lakh to `3 lakh due to the amount of disposables used. The only company which manufactures the robot is the US-based Intuitive Surgicals at Sunnyvale, California. With increased centres for robotic operations in India, the VUI plans to reduce the costs of disposables and tie-up with local companies for their manufacture, apart from increasing the efficiency of the surgery, said Raj Vattikuti of the Vattikuti Foundation.“The efficiency has been increased. While it sued to take me upto two and half hours to perform a surgery previously, with the robotic surgery, it takes nearly an hour less. Further, the patient can resume normal life within two weeks time and in 92 per cent of the cases, the patients can be discharged the next day, reducing the hospital bills footed by insurance companies or the patients themselves,” said Dr. Mani Menon who performed the live surgery.