OhioHealth One of First Worldwide to Use New Single Port Robot

OhioHealth Dublin Methodist Hospital recently became one of the first hospitals in the world to use new technology for the da Vinci® Surgical System robot that utilizes a single port of entry for the robotic arms and camera. Typically for robotic surgery, a patient would have four incisions. Now, they only have one.

Dr. Ronney Abaza, a robotic urologic surgeon at Dublin Methodist is one of the first five surgeons in the world to complete more than 5,000 robotic cases. He was at the helm of the first single port robotic surgery in central Ohio in mid-January, doing surgery to remove a cancerous growth from a patient’s kidney.

“At the end of the operation, they have just one scar instead of four,” said Dr. Abaza. “So hopefully that means faster recovery, less soreness afterward, they’ll be up and walking faster, get home faster. So that’s what we’re trying to accomplish by reducing the number of incisions that we make.”

Since the technology is still so new, Dr. Abaza and other surgeons worldwide are working to determine the best ways to utilize it.

“We need to figure out how we can perfect this technology, just as we have with other types of robotic surgery. So we’re starting with the simplest operations until we get used to the robot to figure out the best operations suited to it, what adjustments we can make working with one incision instead of four,” said Dr. Abaza.

As for the first patient to be operated on with the technology?

“I’m 100% sure he’s going to have a fantastic outcome,” said Dr. Abaza.

To learn more about robotic surgery at OhioHealth, click here.