A new era in laparoscopic surgery. Evaluation of robot-assisted laparoscopic procedures

OBJECTIVE: To present the experience with the advanced technology of robot-assisted laparoscopic surgery at our institute.

METHODS: We reviewed and present patients who had robot-assisted laparoscopic surgical procedures, between April 2003 and March 2004, at King Khalid University Hospital, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. All procedures were carried out using the da Vinci system (Intuitive Surgical, Mountain View, Ca, USA). We recorded the time for system setup, operating time, morbidity and postoperative hospital stay.

RESULTS: We performed 42 robot-assisted laparoscopic operations. The most frequently performed operations were robot-assisted cardiac procedures (n=25), laparoscopic cholecystectomy (n=9) other operations were: thymectomy (4), apical bullectomy (2), and one for each adrenalectomy, and lung volume reduction. The median time to install and drape the robotic system was 15 minutes. In 2 patients (4.7%) we converted the procedures to conventional laparoscopy or open. There was postoperative wound infection at the site of the port in one patient. The average postoperative hospital stay was similar to conventional laparoscopic procedures.

CONCLUSION: Robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery is feasible, safe and may become the surgical procedure of the future.