Robotic Surgery May Allow for Quicker Procedures With Less Radiation

Govindarajan Narayanan, MD, explained that the advent of the Epione surgical robot may be a precursor to future technological advancements in the world of surgical oncology, including the potential for practices to treat patients remotely and with less radiation.

In an interview with CancerNetwork^®, Narayanan, a professor of Radiology and an interventional radiologist at Miami Cardiac and Vascular Institute and the chief of Interventional Oncology at Miami Cancer Institute, Baptist Health South Florida, described how Epione “levels the playing field” by making the surgical process quicker while potentially increasing the availability of physicians who can offer surgery to patients across centers. He said that practices in other countries have already been operating the surgical robot remotely, which would allow patients to undergo surgery at treatment centers even if a practicing physician is not there in-person.

Developers designed the Epione robot to streamline several probe procedures, thereby making treatment of large tumors via microwave ablation, cryoablation, irreversible electroporation, and other strategies more predictable.

Transcript:

[Epione] levels the playing field. It can bring less experienced users to do these procedures with a higher level of accuracy. That may improve the availability of physicians who can offer these treatments in multiple centers.

We are at the beginning of an exciting technology that’s being introduced in the space of image-guided ablation. In other countries, they’re using these robotic devices remotely; I feel that we will eventually get to the point where the science would allow us to operate on patients in remote locations, thereby improving access to these cutting-edge technologies in different institutions where they may not have the physician stationed there. [I see Epione] being able to help less experienced physicians do more complex cases with less radiation, quicker procedure times, and [the potential for] remote access. That is where I see this [technology] going.

Reference

Epione. Quantum Surgical. Accessed November 7, 2023. https://shorturl.at/dqyL6