near and far to have their joints replaced by surgeons who operate
with the help of robotic assistance.
Unmatched accuracy
Precision is paramount during total hip or total knee replacements.
Even the most skilled surgeons can't compete with the accuracy of
bone cuts made during robotic-assisted surgery.
"It makes what we do more precise," says Cedric J. Ortiguera, MD,
orthopedic surgeon at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. "All surgeons
have outliers, a small percentage of procedures where we aim for cer-
tain targets that we end up missing. The use of robotics reduces the
number of outliers and makes surgery a lot more exact."
Getting the cuts and implant placement just right can make or break
the success of a procedure. Being mere millimeters off-target in the
implant's alignment can reduce the overall lifespan of the hardware
and could lead to the need for revision surgery. And if the implant
winds up outside a certain range of ideal placement, the risk of
implant failure is significantly increased.
Robotics has consistently shown to have a positive impact on both
the success rate of procedures and recovery times of patients. "For a
hip, the advantages are cuff position, leg length and offset, which is
how much tension the muscles are under," says K. Seth Kuwik, MD,
an orthopedic surgeon at the Orthopaedic Surgery Center in
Youngstown, Ohio, who has performed approximately 500 robotic
cases since 2015. "For a total knee replacement, it's about getting a
balanced joint, having a knee with neutral alignment and flexion, and
extension gaps that are equal."
By using CT scans to create a virtual 3D model of the patient's
anatomy, robotic platforms allow surgeons to clearly visualize exactly
what they'll be operating on before the first cut is made. The image-
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