Robotic reliability
I often get asked about the reliability of the daVinci robot and can it break down. I also received a comment from a reader about a bad experience with her husbands robotic surgery.
In my 299 robotic operations, we have had several problems.
The daVinci robots are complicated mechanical devices. They can break down. Robots can break down in different ways. They can have hardware failures, such as broken arms. We had this happen to our 4th arm on our standard daVinci once and performed the operation with only 3 arms.
They can have software failures and the robot is made to stop working and will not allow you to move any instruments. This happened twice. Once it was for a robotic nephrectomy which I converted to a laparoscopic nephrectomy without trouble.
The other one was 3/4 of the way through a davinci S dvP and I brought in our standard robot, which was not in use, and finished the operation with our 2nd robot.
2 other operations were affected by robotic failures that were discovered before the operation was started and 1 case was cancelled and 1 was delayed until our robot was fixed.
Robots can break down occasionally, and contingency plans should be in place, including conversion to laparoscopy or open surgery.
I am not familiar with any injuries caused by robotic failure or malfunction.
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Comments
My husband underwent robot assisted radical prostatectomy on December 20, 2006 at (editors change) a midwest hospital. An hour and a half into the surgery a light bulb on the control tower exploded splattering glass on to the wall of the operating room.
The surgeon converted to open surgery. During the open surgery my husband's pulse went up to 190. He required 3 blood transfusions. He spent the next two days in intensive care and the next two days after that on the cardiac care floor.
Intuitive Surgical sent an inspector that evening from California to examine the equipment. I have yet to find out if it was hospital or Intuitive Surgical that was at fault.
Equipment in an operating room shouldn't explode. My husband's recovery expanded from three to six weeks. He's still dealing with incontinence and impotence problems.
Has anyone out there experienced similar problems with Intuitive Surgical? All I can find are glowing reports. How could it be that we alone experienced such a horrible failure?
Posted by: Pat McCarthy | March 2, 2007 10:05 PM
Dear Pat,
I am sorry that you had such an awful experience.
As you can tell from my post, equipment can fail and we have had several problems with the robotic system.
I have the luxury of having 2 other robots in my hospital, and would probably finish most operations laparoscopically if I did not have nay available, but I think it should be kept in mind that this is a possibility and it is a fair question to ask your surgeon what he would do if he had a failure.
1 upgrade on the S robot is the ability to de-activate 1 arm and still use the robot with 3 arms properly. With the standard, the whole robot will not work if any one arm is not working.
Posted by: Domenico Savatta, MD | March 2, 2007 10:14 PM
I had robotic surgery on December 21, 2006. The surgery, from what I've been told was uneventful and successful. A little over two months later, I have incontinence a impotence. Pat should realize that her husbands's surgery is relatively recent and further improvement is likely to occur in the coming months.
Posted by: Bill Tuikka | March 3, 2007 1:37 AM
This is a special thank you to Dr. Savatta . Last summer my in law was living in Greece and was informed that he had prostate cancer. He decided to come to the US and get other opinions , we saw a few doctors and they all recommended no surgery due to his age , however he wanted the cancer out of him . That's when i did a little research and we went to see Doctor Savatta . I must say we were very happy with the Doctor's knowledge and personality .
A good person that understands the patient's feelings and the families concerns .The Surgery was performed last july and today 7 months later no problems at all , all bloodwork comes back OK and most of all absolutely no leakage .
A special thanks to Doctor Savatta and and staff
Keep up the Good Work!!
Posted by: Clemente Bottone | March 4, 2007 3:55 PM