On Monday, May 22nd, I performed a live telecast from Newark Beth Israel to the American Urologic Association Conference in Atlanta of a dvP. This was my first live telecast of a surgical procedure.
Our case was a success. The patient did very well and was discharged within 24 hours with minimal pain.
The robotic time was 80 minutes for the procedure.
I would like to thank my team at NBI and the administration for the support, as well as intuitive surgical and their engineers for helping to make the telecast go without a glitch.
I am hopeful to get a copy of the video/audio feed to stream on my website.
Some points about the procedure that were discussed:
For patients:
I usually find I do not need to place a drain after the procedure. Although I will at times, I havent left one in over 80 dvPs and havent had a problem.
This surgery took about 80 minutes with an additional 30 minutes of set-up time, but the procedure can take between 70 minutes and 3 hours depending on many factors include patient weight, size of the prostate, prior surgeries, and many other factors. Everything else being equal, then quicker is better, but take as much time as is necessary to allow for the best operation to be done.
For urologists:
I think the no cautery techniqe for the neurovascular bundle that was shown helps bring back erectile function sooner. This should be done in some fashion if possible.
There are many techniques that have been shown to be effective and it is important to watch different experts videos and choose techniques that you are comfortable with.
It is important to track your patient outcomes for the benefit of patient education, but also to try to improve your results.
I have case observations available for physicians interested in travelling to Newark beth Israel to watch live surgery. Contact me through my office and this can be arranged.
We have a new training center at Newark Beth Israel. It has the worlds first hospital based da Vinci S training robot. Surgeons interested in being trained in robotic surgery should inquire through my office or Newark’s Beth Israel Robotic Training Center. There is also a da Vinci S training center at intuitive’s surgical headquarters in Sunnyvale, CA.