In Spain, a fully robotic lung transplant was performed for the first time in the world
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Spanish doctors successfully performed the world’s first fully robotic lung transplant. To perform the operation, surgeons in Barcelona used a robot with four “arms” called “Da Vinci”, reports The Next Web. The patient was a 65-year-old man named Xavier. He was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, a life-threatening lung disease that causes scarring. As doctors explain, this disease affects older people and rarely occurs in those under 50 years of age. Most often it affects men. Photo: abidal/Depositphotos Before the operation, surgeons removed air from the donor lung to reduce the size of the organ. As a result, it was possible to place it in the rib cage through an incision only 8 cm wide. Small incisions were made near the ribs to accommodate the “hands” of the robot and 3D cameras, thanks to which the surgeons were able to examine the cavity inside. Doctors claim that the new technology is less painful for the patient and reduces the risk of postoperative infection, as the wound is easily closed. “We believe that this technique will improve patients’ quality of life, shorten the postoperative period and reduce pain,” said Dr. Albert Jauregui, head of the Department of Thoracic Surgery and Lung Transplantation at Val d’Hebron University Hospital. Due to this, the postoperative incision was small, Xavier had to take only paracetamol. And traditional lung transplantation usually requires postoperative treatment with much stronger painkillers, doctors emphasize. “From the moment I regained consciousness and woke up from general anesthesia, I did not feel pain,” the patient said. The Da Vinci robot was developed by the American corporation Intuitive Surgical in 2000. Now it is used to treat hundreds of thousands of patients. The system does not perform the operation itself, but broadcasts the movements of the surgeon’s hands in real time. Before the described case, the robot was used for a lung transplant only once – in a hospital in Los Angeles, USA. However, then “Da Vinci” performed the operation only partially, and the lung, as before, was inserted into the chest in the traditional way. According to Dr. Jauregui, other patients on the waiting list for lung transplant surgery will now be offered the new technique. He added that he hopes that the new approach to lung transplantation will become a world standard in the future. It will be recalled that scientists from China have created a robot that can switch between liquid and solid states, as well as navigate in complex environments without compromising its strength. Read also: She could not eat or drink for 30 years: a woman with a rare diagnosis was saved in Lviv with the help of a robot surgeon
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