Maple Grove Hospital Celebrates Milestone With 6,000 Robot-Assisted Surgeries
There’s a big celebration happening at North Memorial Health – Maple Grove Hospital. It’s a birthday party for a robot — but not just any robot.
The hospital is honoring its da Vinci Surgical System, which the hospital has had on hand for 10 years now. It’s also celebrating 6,000 surgeries using the system.
The da Vinci system can handle a variety of specialties, including urology and gynecology, two of surgeon Dr. Anna McNanley’s specialties.
“I love it, because we can really marry hands-on surgery, and improving patients’ lives with technology,” McNanley said.
McNanley has done more than 500 of those surgeries and said she sees the benefits of a minimally invasive system like da Vinci.
Using the system is like a surgeon working with hands, but with precise robotic fingers that are all about the size of a pinky.
McNanley said this doesn’t replace human health care professionals, but rather makes their work more accurate.
“There are a lot of features and technical advantages with the robot that allow us to achieve a result that allows the patient to recover in a quicker way, with less pain,” McNanley said.
Dr. Kourtney Kemp, a surgeon at Maple Grove Hospital, demonstrates the da Vinci Surgical System from its console. Inside, she can see what she is working on and control the system’s arms.
Hands-On Celebration
The hospital celebrated on Monday with a cake, decorated robots and an opportunity for people to come check out the technology.
Dr. Kourtney Kemp, also a surgeon at the hospital, demonstrated the system by sitting at the console. She explained it has a number of features to make surgery precise and safe, including an anti-tremor feature on the hand controls.
“You get better visualization. You can zoom in much better than your eyes,” Kemp said, referencing both the console and large display screen next to the surgical table.
More than 1,000 of the 6,000 surgeries done with the da Vinci system were performed by Kemp.
“The safety, quality, the outcomes are significant, from the surgeons that are doing its standpoint,” Kemp said.
She said that every patient wants the most efficient surgery, and it seems like the robot-assisted system offers them that.
“Each individual patient is what matters to me, you know. Them having the best operation, them having the best outcome,” Kemp said. “I’m very pleased with the health system, that they made this a priority for their patients, that they made it a priority for their health system.”
The da Vinci system isn’t just in use in Maple Grove. Nationwide, surgeons have completed 14 million procedures using the technology. That’s according to its company, Intuitive Surgical.
The arms of the da Vinci surgical system work at a demo piece. Surgeons say its like working with fingers the size of your pinky– but with a much greater range of motion.
