A Robot with Heart
Isn't this Wonderful!!
Robotic Cardiac Surgery at Rambam Health Care Campus - Photo by Ofer Golan
For the first time in Israel, bypass cardiac surgery has been performed on a patient – by a three-armed robot.
Last week at Rambam, the ‘da Vinci’ robot conducted this procedure on Moshe Breyer (53) from Yokneam Illit. Up until now, da Vinci has been primarily used in urological and gynecological procedures. Two of the robot’s three arms replace the surgeons’ hands, while the third serves as a camera, which during surgery, provides 3D videos of inside the patient’s chest.
“The robot enables doctors to enter the heart without damaging the ribs, and does not require a wide opening in the chest,” says Prof. Gil Bolotin, Director of the Department of Cardiac Surgery. “This is a great advantage to the patient. The small cut reduces post-surgical pain, recovery time, and chance of infection,” he adds.
During the operation, the surgeon operates the robot from a console and a three-dimensional screen enlarges the area of surgery.
“This technology enables the bypass operation without opening the chest bone, moving the heart or connecting the patient to a heart-lung machine,” says Prof. Bolotin. “This prevents major possible complications that usually occur in open heart surgery.”
Prof. Bolotin said that he and his team were very excited before the first operation. “We went through a long learning process until we were ready to use the robot in open heart surgery.”
Breyer had suffered a massive heart attack, had compromised day-to-day function and was on daily medication. When Prof. Bolotin explained to him that the operation represented a solution with only minimal damage to the chest, the patient said he’d do what was necessary.
Breyer’s wife Ofra, remains staunchly loyal to the human team, which included Prof. Bolotin, Dr. Zvi Peled, both cardiac surgeons, Dr. Avishai Ziser (anesthesiologist) and Dr. Carey Titin, a Finnish cardiac surgeon who came to Rambam to teach the procedure. “Maybe the robot did the operation,” said Ofra Breyer, “but it was really the doctors who saved my husband’s life.”
A Robot with Heart
Isn't this Wonderful!!
Robotic Cardiac Surgery at Rambam Health Care Campus - Photo by Ofer Golan
For the first time in Israel, bypass cardiac surgery has been performed on a patient – by a three-armed robot.
Last week at Rambam, the ‘da Vinci’ robot conducted this procedure on Moshe Breyer (53) from Yokneam Illit. Up until now, da Vinci has been primarily used in urological and gynecological procedures. Two of the robot’s three arms replace the surgeons’ hands, while the third serves as a camera, which during surgery, provides 3D videos of inside the patient’s chest.
“The robot enables doctors to enter the heart without damaging the ribs, and does not require a wide opening in the chest,” says Prof. Gil Bolotin, Director of the Department of Cardiac Surgery. “This is a great advantage to the patient. The small cut reduces post-surgical pain, recovery time, and chance of infection,” he adds.
During the operation, the surgeon operates the robot from a console and a three-dimensional screen enlarges the area of surgery.
“This technology enables the bypass operation without opening the chest bone, moving the heart or connecting the patient to a heart-lung machine,” says Prof. Bolotin. “This prevents major possible complications that usually occur in open heart surgery.”
Prof. Bolotin said that he and his team were very excited before the first operation. “We went through a long learning process until we were ready to use the robot in open heart surgery.”
Breyer had suffered a massive heart attack, had compromised day-to-day function and was on daily medication. When Prof. Bolotin explained to him that the operation represented a solution with only minimal damage to the chest, the patient said he’d do what was necessary.
Breyer’s wife Ofra, remains staunchly loyal to the human team, which included Prof. Bolotin, Dr. Zvi Peled, both cardiac surgeons, Dr. Avishai Ziser (anesthesiologist) and Dr. Carey Titin, a Finnish cardiac surgeon who came to Rambam to teach the procedure. “Maybe the robot did the operation,” said Ofra Breyer, “but it was really the doctors who saved my husband’s life.”