INCHEON — Advanced single-port robotic surgery, once concentrated at large university hospitals in Seoul, is taking root as a stable treatment option in the surgical departments of regional general hospitals. By absorbing procedures that tertiary hospitals had monopolized because of the high cost of the equipment, regional hospitals are turning back the flow of patients who traveled long distances for care.
Incheon Sejong Hospital said on the 22nd that it is approaching a cumulative 1,000 single-port robotic surgeries, three years after opening its robotic surgery center in September 2023.
The hospital operates the da Vinci SP, a fourth-generation system designed specifically for single-port procedures. Unlike conventional laparoscopic or robotic surgery, which requires three or four openings, it uses a single incision inside the navel to insert a camera and instruments into the body. The narrower incision hides the scar within the navel and is intended to reduce post-operative pain and the burden of recovery.
The three-dimensional high-definition camera that moves inside the body has multi-joint articulation, helping surgeons secure a precise field of view even deep inside a narrow abdominal or pelvic cavity.
Clinical applications have expanded across multiple departments, including obstetrics and gynecology, general surgery, urology, and cardiovascular and thoracic surgery. The technique is being used to treat patients with large or multiple uterine fibroids, as well as for gallbladder removal, hernia, pneumothorax, benign prostatic hyperplasia and kidney cancer. Surgeries have also been performed, following multidisciplinary consultation, on high-risk patients with organ adhesions from prior abdominal operations or with underlying conditions such as heart disease or a need for dialysis.
"No single approach — open surgery, laparoscopy or robotics — is unconditionally superior. The principle is to choose the optimal treatment by comprehensively assessing the patient's underlying conditions and the location of the lesion," said Lee Sung-bae, head of the robotic surgery center and a general surgeon at Incheon Sejong Hospital. "We will maintain a safe surgical care infrastructure so that patients in the region can receive treatment with confidence."
