Intelligence Unit
Special Reports
Special Events
Subscribe/Buy
Sponsored
Departments
- Leadership
- Finance
- Technology
- Physicians
- Community Hospitals
- Health Plans
- Marketing
- Quality
- Nursing
- HR
Follow Us
What's Wrong with the da Vinci Robot?
Leonardo da Vinci was a study in contradictions: He was an artist and a scientist who often didn't finish what he started. He despised war but invented deadly weapons. As the painter of the Mona Lisa, he was highly praised, but only completed a few other artistic works. He studied elements of flying, but never published his ideas.
Da Vinci's inconsistencies made me think of the da Vinci Robot, his namesake device that some see as revolutionizing healthcare and others see as revolting: Indeed, it is a study in conflict itself.
Surgeons control the da Vinci from a console designed for minimally invasive techniques.
The robot was once again in the news recently in the wake of a report from the ECRI Institute that identified the da Vinci robot, as well as some other technologies, that fail to improve care—or were weak—based on data the institute collected. The ECRI Institute, based in Plymouth Meeting, PA, researches cost-effectiveness in patient care.
ECRI acknowledges that, as more physician residents are trained in the da Vinci robot, there is growing pressure among hospitals to acquire it, which costs between $1 million to $3 million apiece. What's more, applications for robot-assisted surgery have "outpaced supporting clinical evidence for improved patient outcomes, cost-effectiveness and commensurate reimbursement," ECRI states.
- Urologists 'Outraged' Over PSA Test Challenge
- New Facebook Page Gathers Stories of Medical Harm
- Luxury Hospital Facilities Put Patient Experience First
- Five Hospitals Share Three Secrets to Improve Knee Surgery Outcomes
- Heartland Health Joins Mayo Clinic Network
- Beleaguered Fairview Health CEO to Retire in July
- Health Insurance Exchanges Put Defined Benefits to the Test
- Challenging Physicians to Help Improve the ED
- For hospitals and insurers, new fervor to cut costs
- The Power of Plugged-In Physicians
Comments are moderated. Please be patient.
Dave V (1/26/2012 at 4:13 PM)
Another article citing ECRI and their archaic statements. It seems ECRI never bothers to do even rudimentary research with surgeons currently using the system or patients that are routinely spared large incisions. While ECRI continues to position da Vinci surgery as 'Experimental and not clinically superior', patients and surgeons have now made it the Number 1 treatment for prostate cancer in the world. It is the da Vinci robot alone that has lowered open hysterectomy rates from 65% nationally to 45% nationally[INVALID]something previous treatments have been unable to do. Come on ECRI[INVALID]you are quickly making your organization seem irrelevant. No, da Vinci is not for everyone, and it's not a magical cure. It is a tool that allows surgeons to go places and do things through small holes that they could only dream of with just their hands. Wake up ECRI.
Kerry Willis MD (1/26/2012 at 2:10 PM)
You really should talk to surgeons at a center where it is used for Cardiothoracicsurgery. The Da Vinci is nothing less than a miracle in lessening LOS from CT surgery and not lilling older people in need of valve replacement or lung resection . Having expererinced this with family as well as my patients, your soruce was either ignorant or not partial in his assesment.