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Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

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Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#11
post #8

How could it be inoperable if a human controlled robot managed to remove it?

TL;DR: old human hand based surgery breaks the jaw to get to the area of the throat where the cancer was. Causes lots of complications after; or is simply deemed too hard.

The robot is more dextrous and thinner and can do the surgery without breaking the jawbones.

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#12
I have been hearing about Da Vinci for years and Wikipedia says it was being for 200,000 surgeries back in 2012. [0] The manufacturer claims there are about 7000 of the units.

Is this remarkable? I would imagine that it saves thousands of lives a year.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Da_Vinci_Surgical_System

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#13
post #7

Robotic head and neck surgery is routine at major medical centers all over. Da Vinci has been around for many years and it is human controlled. I’m glad this patient was helped but there is absolutely nothing interesting otherwise about this.

What an amazing world we live in. There is nothing interesting about a robotic assisted surgery able to perform more delicate and sophisticated operations than the best human surgeon in the world.

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#14
One time in med school we had a lecture by the da Vinci surgeon guy, and of course I had to stick my hand up. “Will there ever come a time when the human hand cannot keep up with the instrument?” The whole room (200 people) laughed out loud, and the surgeon said, “No.”

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#16
Anyone know more about robot assist systems in general? Are there similar systems for performing delicate assembly operations on a production line? (Non medical)

The die binders that I used to use had physical motion reduction systems - are there more general versions of these available?

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#17
post #7

Robotic head and neck surgery is routine at major medical centers all over. Da Vinci has been around for many years and it is human controlled. I’m glad this patient was helped but there is absolutely nothing interesting otherwise about this.

What an amazing world we live in. There is nothing interesting about a robotic assisted surgery able to perform more delicate and sophisticated operations than the best human surgeon in the world.

[deleted]

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#19
post #7

Robotic head and neck surgery is routine at major medical centers all over. Da Vinci has been around for many years and it is human controlled. I’m glad this patient was helped but there is absolutely nothing interesting otherwise about this.

What an amazing world we live in. There is nothing interesting about a robotic assisted surgery able to perform more delicate and sophisticated operations than the best human surgeon in the world.

>What an amazing world we live in.

The kind of amazing where untold millions of people can't afford basic healthcare in the same country that we have a robot surgeon?

Re: Da Vinci robot surgeon removes inoperable tumor, saving patient’s life

#20

“Surgeon removes tumor using current best practices” doesn’t sound so exciting, but is actually more amazing. These devices have made some hard surgeries much more doable.

In this case, it's about a "inoperable tumor" so I'm guessing a human hand wouldn't be able to do it at all. That's what makes this particular case more amazing.
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