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• Growth potential. The robot has even lowered our hospital's admission
rates, as we've been able to convert a lot of formerly inpatient surgeries to out-
patient. And from a clinical standpoint, it's improved recovery times and patient
satisfaction. We've even been able to get the cost down to where there's a negli-
gible difference between robotic surgery and conventional lap surgery. We've
also seen an improvement in our referral patterns. Satisfied patients are spread-
ing the word, and we've grown from about 30 hernia cases per quarter to about
150 per quarter.
Future applications
We're just scratching the surface in regard to what the robot can do. Surgeons
are now performing robotic Whipples (pancreaticoduodenectomies) and liver
resections. The question we need to be asking ourselves is what other abdomi-
nal procedures can be done robotically, now that more surgeons are using the
technology.
Like many younger surgeons, I see the robot as the future of laparoscopic
surgery. It's true that as long as a single company has a monopoly — there
are a couple new platforms that could come online in the near future — it
will be tough to get costs down to where we'd like. But instead of spending
so much time arguing that robots aren't viable, surgical leaders should be
looking both at how to reduce costs and at doing more rigorous studies that
show where the biggest benefits are going to be. The reality is that surgeons
are using the robot and the technology is advancing. In a few years, as robots
gain more acceptance, all the questions about the technology's cost and via-
bility will be moot.
OSM
Dr. Heffner (jjheffner@limamemorial.org)
is a board-certified general surgeon at
Midwest Surgical Specialists in Lima, Ohio.