Doctors perform the surgery remotely in the booth. The operating table is several feet away.
The robotic system will be used for gynecologic, thoracic and urologic procedures at first, but other departments will begin using the equipment as more doctors get used to using the equipment, said Dr. Alice Tsao, a urologist who operates at BWMC.
Robotic systems are expensive, but they allow surgeons to improve upon a practice known as minimally invasive surgery. In this kind of surgery, doctors use small cameras and long, thin metal instruments to operate within key-hole size incisions. This reduces bleeding, pain and recovery time, said Dr. Eric Schwartz, another urologist at the medical center.
Without a robotic arm, doctors cannot maneuver the tiny tools at the end of their instruments, limiting what types of surgery they can do, Tsao said. "I call it operating with chopsticks as opposed to your hand or your wrist," she said. The da Vinci system is better because it mimics the wrist-like movements of the hand and allows doctors greater precision and mobility, she and Schwartz said.
"This has taken prostate surgery from a big, open procedure to a camera procedure," Schwartz said.
The first procedure for the robot was scheduled Thursday, so the naming event was announced the day before. The hospital's marketing department whittled the list of names to three, and the operating room nurses picked the winning name. Each finalist received a bag and cup with the medical center logo, as well as a children's book about robots. Sarah got a bonus: the Tri-Bot Talking Robot - a remote-controlled toy that tells jokes.
Aspen, 6, submitted "Dr. Rob BaWaBot" as her entry. She said the "Ba" was for Baltimore and the "Wa" was for Washington. That her suggestion wasn't chosen didn't dampen Aspen's enthusiasm. She climbed into the chair to operate the robotic arms. She got down and jumped up and down.
"I want to do it again," Aspen said.
Matthew, 8, wanted to name the robot, JTC 2000, because the robot is "just too cool." Of the three students, he was the only one whose feet almost reached the pedals of the machine.
"It's neat," Matthew said, as he took off his scrubs at the end of the visit.
As she left the medical center, Sarah said she knew exactly what she was going to write about in her class journal.
"That I went to the hospital today, and I won," she said.
how it works
Using the da Vinci Surgical System, the surgeon operates while seated at a console viewing a 3-D image of the surgical field. The surgeon's fingers grasp master controls below the display, with hands and wrists naturally positioned relative to his or her eyes. The system translates the surgeon's hand, wrist and finger movements into precise, real-time movements of surgical instruments inside the patient. The system is manufactured by Intuitive Surgical, a Sunnyvale, Calif., company.
Source: Baltimore Washington Medical Center
