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Re: Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
Paul A,
After I seen that article I looked for more information and ran into this article, you might want to look at it too. The failure rate is very low but not something I thought about before. The date of the article is September 2008 so it's current data.
Re: Re: Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
Thanks again. That was a very interesting article. As I would expect, the two parts most likely to fail are the arms and the optical system. While the numbers are small, I'd hate to be under the robot when it did fail. I'm surprised at the long interval between maintenance (6 months). The other spooky part is that they upgrade the software twice a year. Anyone who deals with SW upgrades can tell you that they are approached with caution. A seemingly simple patch can cause unexpected problems.
Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
When I went through the process of selecting a surgeon for my Robotic surgery always asked how many robotic surgeries they had done, whether they had every had an robot failures and what the options are if a failure occurred.
The surgeon I chose kept very thorough records of all patients and in over 1000 operations there were a couple of failures... I don't remember the exact numbers but I think only one failure occurred after the surgery had started and the procedure was finished with traditional laproscopic tools.
Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
David W - me too - I asked my surgeon about failures of the machine. I don't remember the exact details but he said I was lucky because it had failed or broken down just the week before. It cost tens of thousands of pounds to repair and service. I don't know if anyone was being operated on at the time.
On the day of the op I had to sign a form saying that I agreed to a transfer procedure in case of robot failure which meant they would revert to an open prostatectomy. (I sometimes wonder if that is the route I should have gone down anyway, since he left 6 grams in me, even though his robot was working perfectly!)
Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
Guys;
This is just plain inexcusable. A problem like this should never occur. What is strange is that the reports are in technical journals and not in the main stream news. I had never heard of this before. The main stream media ought to be informed. People ought to be told that these crazy robotic things will fail occasionally.
I suspect a coverup.
At times like this i am happy with my T4 status at least i still have my prostate. I may be burried in a couple years but they won't get my prostate.
Re: Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
Of course there's a coverup. I design medical electronics. One of our client's products (one that I did not design, BTW) caught fire in a hospital. The client refuses to allow me to say that in the investigation that I conducted. They want me to say that the unit overheated. I repeated the test in another unit and it caught fire in front of witnesses. They are still digging in their heels. Neither investigative report has been approved yet.
Re: Re: Failure of a robotic arm during da Vinci prostatectomy
Steve B,
That's exactly what I thought when I seen that story and the very reason I posted it here, so the people that frequent this website can spread the word that there are problems with the robotic procedure that you must be aware of. I have worked in high technology my whole life so failures of electronic equipment is nothing new to me, but I will admit before seeing that story it just didn't sink in that a robotic procedure was something to be concerned about, as in failure of the robot during surgery.
