Oct 22 2010
McGill University Health Centre (MUHC) has reported that the first-ever robotic prostatectomy featuring both the da Vinci and Mc Sleepy anesthesia robots was performed on a patient at the Montreal General Hospital.
The da Vinci robot allows the surgeons to operate from remote locations and was installed in MUHC by this summer and Mc Sleepy has been in use since 2008.
Dr. TM Hemmerling of McGill University and MUHC's Department of Anesthesia has stated that the linking of da Vinci surgical robot and Mc Sleepy anesthesia robots is a strategic decision and he said that medical robots can offer safety and accuracy in healthcare, thereby resulting in enhanced outcomes. He mentioned that giving anesthesia for robotic prostatectomy is a challenging task since maintaining the explicit posture of the patient and pronounced muscle relaxation play a vital role in offering ideal conditions for the surgeons. He added that Mc Sleepy robot can adapt to the specific requirements of various procedures like robotic surgery and it assures quality, irrespective of the level of proficiency.
According to Dr. A. Aprikian, Chief and Director of the MUHC Cancer Care Mission, the da Vinci enables them to operate from a workstation featuring surgical tools and the precision offered by robotic-assisted surgery is superior to the conventional procedures. Under his leadership, a team of surgeons had performed the robotic procedure from a workstation along with the help of a video control offering superior three dimensional image quality. Aprikian concluded that the outcomes of the project will be deployed to examine all robotic procedures and anesthesia in many patients as well as in different types of operations, thereby offering quicker, safer and accurate surgical options for their patients.