As robotic surgery becomes more common, robotic surgeons from the United States, India, and Spain were named the top three winners in the KS International Robotic Surgery Innovation competition.
An international jury of experts from Oxford and Stanford Universities, as well as the AIIMS in New Delhi, chose the winners from the fields of urology, gynaecology, general surgery, hepato-biliary-pancreatic surgery, colorectal, head and neck, paediatric, and joint replacement surgery.
The winning entry in the unique competition organised by Michigan-based robotic surgery evangelist Vattikuti Foundation was titled Single Port Robot-Assisted Kidney Transplantation Extraperitoneal Approach’ by Dr Jihad Kaouk, department of urology, Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.
Dr. Kaouk and his colleagues modified a robotic kidney transplant technique developed at the Vattikuti Urology Institute and Medanta Medicity.
Kaouk performed truly minimally invasive surgery using a da Vinci single port robot. “The early results of patients who had undergone robotic kidney transplant through this technique could go home in only 2 days,” the foundation said in a statement.
Indian surgeon ranked second
Dr. Sandeep Nayak, Director, Surgical Oncology, Fortis Cancer Institute, Bengaluru, received the second award for ‘Robotic Infraclavicular Approach for Minimally Invasive Neck Dissection.’
Dr. Nayak developed a robotic technique for performing major cancer surgery on the head and neck in order to clear the lymph nodes in the neck while allowing the patient to recover quickly and with minimal discomfort.
The third prize was given to a team of Dr Alberto Piana, Dr Paolo Verri, and Dr Alberto Breda of Oncology Urology and Kidney Transplant Surgery, Fundacio Puigvert, Barcelona, Spain, for their entry titled ‘3D Augmented Reality Guided Robotic Assisted Kidney Transplantation.’
Vattikuti Foundation has been organising the KS National Robotic Surgery Video’ competition in India since 2015. It went international for the first time in 2022.
“As surgeons continue to innovate newer procedures in robotic surgery, the Vattikuti Foundation will continue to invest and make it accessible to other surgeons,” said Raj Vattikuti, president of Vattikuti Foundation.
