GOYANG — National Health Insurance Service Ilsan Hospital has become the first medical institution in Gyeonggi Province to perform 200 robotic hernia operations, including repairs of inguinal and abdominal wall hernias, demonstrating its surgical expertise and clinical capabilities.
Surgeons at the hospital reached the milestone after expanding the use of robotic surgery beyond inguinal hernias to complex abdominal wall procedures such as umbilical and incisional hernia repairs, the hospital said on the 21st.
Ilsan Hospital introduced the da Vinci Xi system in 2016 and added the da Vinci SP, a single-port robotic platform, last August, sharply strengthening its robotic surgery capacity. The SP system works through a single incision of about 2.5 centimeters and enables fine dissection and precise suturing in narrow, deep areas of the abdominal cavity through a high-resolution three-dimensional view and articulating instruments.
The clinical experience has also produced academic results. A team led by professors Lee Hyung-soon and Chung Sung-woo of the hospital's surgery department published "A Practical Guide to Robotic Transabdominal Preperitoneal Repair for Inguinal Hernia," a step-by-step guide covering the entire robotic laparoscopic inguinal hernia repair procedure known as TAPP, in the international Journal of Surgical Innovation and Education.
The researchers found that three-dimensional stereoscopic vision and unrestricted instrument movement allow precise surgery in the narrow preperitoneal space, improving both the safety and the quality of the operation.
"Based on more than 200 cases across inguinal and abdominal wall hernias, we are focusing on selecting procedures tailored to each patient and on standardizing surgical techniques," Lee said. "By combining the strengths of the existing Xi system and the single-port SP system, we will raise the quality of our medical services another notch."
