Robots Improve Heart Surgeries in Avera and Sanford Facilities

Heart Procedures at the Avera Heart and Sanford hospitals in Sioux Falls would soon be conducted with the help of a robot’s flexible and rotating arm giving the surgeons a complete 360 ◦ view of the patient.

The robot in this hospital is a metallic octopus with a height of eight feet and an ability to stretch to the operating table’s length. The upgraded hybrid labs in these hospitals would utilize this giant camera robot for the vascular and heart procedures. According to Dr. Greg Schultz, a vascular surgeon working at Sanford, this type of operating suite would be of great benefit for treating patients who do not have any hope of cure so far.

Robots have been used in gall bladder and other surgeries for many years where the surgeon watches a screen and manipulates the robotic fingers inside the body cavity. Avera also has two R2-D2 errand boys, which move around delivering pharmaceuticals within the hospital hallways. However, the new robots are a class of their own. They belong to the Artis Zeego System from Siemens Healthcare.

Each Zeego robot has a C-arm mechanism, which has circular movements over and under the patient. This version of C-arm cameras are different from the norm as they include a hardware, which allows them to pivot to project three-dimensional  X-ray photographs on video screens placed above. It also includes an operating table, which is capable of tilting and following the movements of the C-arm as commanded by the joy stick operated by the surgeon. This system million, would reduce the radiation, number of incisions and also the recovery time for the patients while giving the doctors a better panoramic view of their work. According to Jon Soderholm, President of Avera Heart Hospital, the doctors and patients get a great many benefits from this system, which would help them execute operations , which were impossible before.