'Da Vinci' surgery robot helping get patients home more quickly

Shrewsbury & Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH), which runs Shropshire’s two acute hospitals, began using a robotic surgery system called da Vinci XI in June 2023 to assist with the treatment of colorectal, urological and gynaecological diseases. 

Robotic assisted surgery is a minimally invasive - keyhole - surgery that enables the surgeon to perform major operations with more precision than conventional methods.

It has been used to operate on more than 200 patients at SaTH, which runs Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Princess Royal Hospital in Telford, and is helping to reduce the length of time patients are spending in hospital following complex pelvic operations for cancer and non-cancerous conditions.

Around 80 per cent of patients having a robotic hysterectomy at SaTH go home the same day following their surgery and 95 per cent go home within 24 hours. 

Dr John Jones, executive medical director at SaTH, said: “It’s great to see robotic assisted surgery making such a positive difference for our patients and colleagues since we began using it in 2023.

“Our highly skilled surgical teams have embraced this innovative technology and performed over 200 robotic surgery cases across a range of different specialties, which is a huge achievement.

“We are seeing so many benefits including quicker recoveries, fewer complications and some patients no longer need to travel outside of the area for their procedures.”

Mr Adam Farquharson, who performs robotic surgery at SaTH, said: “Robotic assisted surgery allows us to perform major, complex operations for bowel, prostate, kidney and women’s health conditions, giving patients a faster recovery. 

“This means they can return to normal activity or move to their next stage of treatment quickly and with less impact on their body function.

“We operate the robotic system from a surgeon console which uses our hand movements to control instruments on a separate device connected to the patient.

“These instruments provide a very controlled action that enhances the dexterity of a human hand but with greater precision.

“The system also offers high-definition 3D views of the surgical area, which the entire operating theatre can see.

“As well as benefitting our patients, robotic assisted surgery has created a lot of enthusiasm in the Trust and we now have an expert theatre team that carries out all of the robotic surgery cases.

“We enjoy training the medical and nursing staff and it has attracted high calibre consultants to join us.”