Fully operational Robot to assist surgeons at St. Elizabeth Health Center Seventy percent of the prostate surgeries in the United States this year will be robot-assisted.

By WILLIAM K. ALCORN

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

HE DA VINCI S SURGICAL SYSTEM, with its four spider leg-like arms, looks like it belongs on the Sci Fi Channel.

In reality, it is a $1.5 million robot, recently acquired by St. Elizabeth Health Center in Youngstown. It assists surgeons in performing minimally invasive surgery in Youngstown that previously was available only by traveling to Akron, Cleveland or Pittsburgh.

At this point, the robot at St. Elizabeth is used exclusively for prostate surgery, said Dr. Daniel J. Ricchiuti of N.E.O Urology Associates.

Dr. Ricchiuti and Dr. Mark A. Memo, also with N.E.O, which was founded by their fathers, Drs. Robert R. Ricchiuti and Richard A. Memo, are trained to use the robot for prostatectomy surgery. Also in training for the procedure is Dr. Vincent S. Ricchiuti, Daniel’s brother.

With the da Vinci, instead of a surgeon’s eyes being two or three feet from the patient, as in traditional open surgery, with their vision sometimes obscured by blood and tissue, the physician sits at a console and sees the operation field magnified 10 times by the da Vinci’s cameras.

Among other things, the better view enables physicians to better see the nerves that help control erections, so there is less chance for damage, Dr. Ricchiuti said.

How it works

To operate the robot, the surgeon’s forefinger and thumb of each hand are placed in rings, and when the forefinger and thumb are pushed together, the arms, with any of 30 surgical attachments, are activated and easily operated.

High definition cameras translate three-dimension images into the physician’s console. The robot also filters out any tremors in the physician’s hands, said company representative, Shawn McKenna.

A demonstration model of the da Vinci was on display at St. Joseph Health Center in Warren on Friday morning, and at St. Elizabeth’s Boardman campus in the afternoon.

The real da Vinci is permanently stationed in the main operating room at St. Elizabeth downtown, said Suzanne Hsu, nurse coordinator of robotic surgery at St. Elizabeth.

Expanding

Surgical robotics was in its infancy in 1999 when Intuitive Surgical, based in Sunnyvale, Calif., introduced the da Vinci Surgical System, according to the company’s Web site.

But now robotic surgery has arrived: In a few months, when gynecologists have finished training, the robot will also be used for hysterectomies. And in the future, St. Elizabeth hopes to get involved in robot-assisted minimally invasive thoracic surgeries.

It takes two surgeons working in tandem to perform the prostate surgery. Drs. Ricchiuti and Memo have done two at St. Elizabeth, and have done numerous prostatectomies in Akron, where they have taken their patients in the past.

Other advantages of minimally invasive prostatectomies include six tiny scars instead of a large scar, quicker recovery time, less pain and shorter hospital stays, said Dr. Memo.

alcorn@vindy.com