St. Luke’s First in Houston to Use Intuitive Surgical Robot

St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital is the first facility in Houston to use the da Vinci Intuitive Surgical Robot for two gynecological procedures and prostate cancer surgery.

Robotic surgery is minimally invasive, allowing patients to have complex procedures performed through tiny incisions. Patients report less pain and are able to recover in a very short period of time.

"I was very pleased with this new technology," said Leslie Miles, 36, a nurse and resident of Sugar Land. "The robotic laparoscopic procedure was done at 8 a.m., and I was home by 2:30 p.m. I only had to take one pain pill and was back at work in a few days, whereas previous surgeries for the same thing – removal of fibroid tumors and adhesions in my fallopian tubes – would cause me to be off work for six weeks."

Had it not been for the da Vinci robot, Miles says she might not have had the procedure performed because of all the pain she experienced in previous surgeries. Now, not only is she glad that her experience was so painless, but she is also excited that she and her husband will be able to undergo in vitro fertilization to conceive.

St. Luke’s is one of five U.S. sites involved in an FDA-approved study to investigate the da Vinci Surgical Robot manufactured by Intuitive Surgical of Mountain View, Calif. Dr. O.H. Frazier, chief of cardiopulmonary transplantation and director of surgical research at the Texas Heart Institute and chief of transplant service at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital, is the national principal co-investigator of the study.

"The surgical robot has important applications in cancer surgery," said Dr. Brian J. Miles, medical director of St. Luke’s Texas Cancer Institute. "The da Vinci system is a great leap forward in robotic and laparoscopic surgery. This device faithfully recreates the surgical field that we would normally see during an open procedure and also faithfully reproduces all hand motions, which until now has been all but impossible laparoscopically. For cancer patients, complex surgeries such as radical prostatectomies and nephrectomies can now be done by this minimally invasive approach."

Dr. Miles and Dr. Kevin M. Slawin are currently performing prostate cancer surgery at St. Luke’s using the da Vinci surgical robot. Dr. Slawin said, "Minimally invasive urologic procedures will be more readily available to our patients, making the da Vinci robot a dramatic step for surgical care of patients in the 21st century."

The robotic system consists of a surgeon’s viewing and control console and a patient sidecart consisting of three robotic arms that position and maneuver endoscopic instruments. The system translates the surgeon’s natural hand, wrist and finger movements on instrument controls at the surgeon’s console outside the patient’s body into corresponding micromovements of instruments positioned inside the patient through small puncture incisions or ports.

"Each decade brings new advances and technology in laparoscopic surgery. This year, the intelligent minds behind the da Vinci Robot have brought space-age technology to the surgical field of medicine," said Dr. David Zepeda. "I foresee many improvements in today’s robot that will further impact surgery in the future, including off-site remote surgery." Dr. Zepeda performed the first two robotic procedures, one of which was a laparoscopic anastomosis (tubal ligation reversal).

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©2006 Texas Medical Center

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