Robot Improves Surgery

Doctor Scott Bailey, a gynecology and obstetrics specialist at Northwest Medical Center`s Willow Creek Women`s Hospital, says this type of surgery has many benefits-- including a quicker recovery time-- and is ideal for patients with special cases. Bailey used the Da Vinci robotic surgical system to perform a hysterectomy on a woman who was suffering from pelvic pain and fibroids. Normally, Bailey says he would make a 2 to 3 inch incision across the abdomen, but with the Da Vinci, scars are reduced to a few small pinpoints. "It`s much less intrusive, the recovery from it is much quicker...and the blood loss is less," Bailey says. He says patients who have surgery using the Da Vinci can go home that same afternoon and be back at work within 48 hours. The Da Vinci robot can also be used to perform surgeries on patients with pelvic organ pro-lapse and patients wanting to have their tubes put back together. Bailey says the robotic system allows doctors to see better and have an extended range of motion. "You can grab a needle with it...and you can hold the tissue up, sew it together, tie your knots on it, it`s truly like doing an open procedure that we used to have to open them up with, but we`ve got our little hands in there working, it`s phenomenal." Northwest Medical Center in Springdale has the only Da Vinci robotic system in Northwest Arkansas.