The United States has reached a new medical milestone with the first robotic-assisted liver transplant. This procedure brought the advantages of minimally invasive surgery, such as reduced pain, faster recovery and precision in performing the operation, even in the case of complex interventions.
This medical innovation took place at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in May and was performed by a team of surgeons from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, according to a recent statement from the university.
The recipient patient, a 60-year-old man with liver cancer and cirrhosis caused by the hepatitis C virus, recovered surprisingly quickly after the procedure. Unlike the usual six weeks of recovery from a liver transplant, he was able to walk and return to his normal activities in less than a month, including golf and swimming.
Dr. Adeel Khan, a transplant surgeon who led the team in performing this revolutionary procedure and an associate professor of surgery at the School of Medicine, said the transplant was a success, the operation went smoothly and the new liver began to grow. work immediately. , and the patient recovered without surgical complications.
The traditional liver transplant procedure involves a large incision, which can be painful and requires a longer recovery period. In contrast, robot-assisted surgeries offer a minimally invasive approach. Surgeons control robotic instruments at close range using joystick controls, which provide a magnified three-dimensional view of the operating area, enabling precision that conventional methods cannot achieve.
For this procedure, the medical team made several small, key-sized incisions, as well as a 15-centimeter vertical incision, much smaller than the traditional approach. This technique speeds up the patient’s recovery because it does not require cutting the abdominal muscles.
The procedure took just over eight hours, but that time is expected to decrease as the team gets used to the robotic method.
It is worth noting that South Korea carried out the first robotic-assisted partial liver transplant in 2021, which involved half of the liver from a living donor. The team led by Dr. Khan is a pioneer in performing robotic whole liver transplants.
Dr. William Chapman, a leading figure in the Division of General Surgery at the University of Washington, praised this achievement and noted that the advantages of this technique will become more evident with experience.
The robotic transplant team was created five years ago and initially focused on kidney transplants. To date, they have successfully performed more than 30 of these transplants and several other procedures involving the liver, pancreas and stomach.
This medical advance opens new perspectives in the field of organ transplantation and can significantly improve the quality of life of patients, as well as the results of complex surgical interventions.
Source: 360medical.ro
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2023-09-18 23:43:09
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