Johannesburg – Surgeons at two private hospitals in South Africa are using a four-armed robot with a high definition camera to remove cancerous prostate glands in men more accurately and less invasively than traditional surgery. And it can even be used to peel grapes. Since the device was installed at Nectare’s Waterfall City Hospital in Midrand and Christiaan Barnard Memorial Hospital in Cape Town in mid-2014, it has been used to perform prostatectomies on about 200 men. It is also in use in Europe and the US. The da Vinci surgical system consists of a console at which a surgeon sits while peering at a magnified, three-dimensional, high definition image of the area they are working on. They remotely control four robotic arms, one of which is an endoscope, a thin tube with a camera at the end. The other three hold the instruments, which have more flexibility than a human wrist. As the surgery is less invasive results in shorter recovery time, about three days as opposed to seven when using traditional, more invasive methods, according to Netcare statistics. It also means less risk of infection, less blood loss, reduced risk of incontinence and erectile dysfunction, and less pain afterwards, urologist Marius Conradie was quoted as saying in a statement. Dr Gregory Boustead, consultant advisor in robotic surgery to Netcare hospitals, said while it was initially being used for radical prostatectomies, it would in future be used for other urology applications and in other medical disciplines, as was happening internationally. In April, urologist Marius Conradie used it to remove a cancerous kidney in a patient at the Waterfall City Hospital. “It was the first ever robotic-assisted procedure of its kind in South Africa,” Boustead was quoted as saying. According to the Prostate Cancer Foundation, one in six men would get prostate cancer at some point in their life.
Surgeons at about 200 private hospitals in South Africa are using a four-armed robot with a high definition camera to successfully remove cancerous prostate glands in men more accurately and less invasively than traditional surgery. The da Vinci surgical system has so far been used to perform prostatectomies on two men and is being used in hospitals across Europe and the US.