Spectrum News 1: Cedars-Sinai Surgeons Embrace the Power of Robot-Assisted Surgeries

Spectrum News 1 recently interviewed Philip Brazio, MD, a plastic surgeon in the Jim and Eleanor Randall Department of Surgery at Cedars-Sinai, about performing the medical center’s first robot-assisted microsurgery for lymphedema. 

The condition causes painful swelling in the arms and legs and often occurs after cancer treatment when lymph nodes have been removed or damaged. A microsurgical procedure called lymphovenous bypass surgery can improve lymphedema, but precision is critical because lymphatic vessels are tiny and the sutures are thinner than a human hair. 

Brazio told Spectrum News 1 reporter Zarina Khairzada that robot-assisted microsurgery, in which surgeons use 3D goggles and chopstick-like instruments while a robotic system mimics their movements, minimizes natural hand tremors and enhances accuracy.

For the complex and delicate lymphovenous bypass surgery, a robot-assisted platform “helps filter out that tremor so that it’s a non-issue” he said.

Brazio, program director of the Complex Reconstruction and Microsurgery Fellowship, told Khairzada he expects the robot-assisted minimally invasive procedure, which also allows for faster recovery times for patients, to become more common in the future.

“One of the things that we are trying to do is train up some of our residents and fellows and get them working with it so that from early on, perhaps before they’ve even really mastered microsurgery conventionally, they are already being able to incorporate the robotic technology into their operations,” he said.

Cedars-Sinai was the first hospital in the western U.S. to perform microsurgical robot-assisted procedures.

Click here to watch the complete segment from Spectrum News 1.