TITLE:
Robots in Cancer Surgery: A Boon or Bane
AUTHORS:
Yusuf Jamal, Abdulrahman M. Alshahrani, Jamal M. Arif, Feras M. Almarshad
KEYWORDS:
Da Vinci, Robotic Surgery, Laparoscopic Surgery, Cancers, Oncologic Outcomes
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Cancer Therapy,
Vol.11 No.12,
December
15,
2020
ABSTRACT: It is an ongoing task to
keep exploring and applying the best available technology to alleviate the pain
and sufferings of the cancer patients. Since the discovery of robotic surgery, da
Vinci surgical systems have played a special and significant role in cancer
surgeries worldwide, however, surgeons are still skeptical with the clinical
and oncological outcomes which are almost comparable to the laparoscopic
approach in several cancers. Many meta-analyses using mostly retrospective
studies indicated significant advantage of robotic surgery over laparoscopic or
open surgery approaches for various cancers, however, scarcity of technically
sound robot savvy surgeons and quality multicentered, multinational,
coordinated, random clinical trials had not done justice to the positives of
robotic surgery which were quite often suppressed by the negative factors like
operative cost and oncological outcomes. Nevertheless, robotic surgery approach
has been clinically accepted for hysterectomy and prostatectomy. This overview
briefly discusses the comparative approaches (open, laparoscopic, robotic
assisted) and their clinical outcomes in the surgery of various cancers.