What Can a Medical Robot do for Me?

What Types of Medical Robots Does Penn Highlands Healthcare Offer?

Monarch™ Platform

The Lung Center at Penn Highlands offers services with the Monarch robot, which enables earlier and more accurate diagnosis of small and hard-to-reach nodules in the periphery of the lung.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer related deaths worldwide. In its early stages, lung cancer presents with no symptoms. In our region, diseases of the lungs are higher than the national average due to environmental, occupational and lifestyle factors, such as radon exposure and smoking. Lung cancer can be severe in nature; therefore the ability to quickly and accurately diagnose the disease is very important.

There are a variety of diagnostic options currently available for lung cancer diagnosis, but few are ideal when it comes to accuracy, safety, or minimal invasiveness. These limitations can lead to false-positives, false-negatives, or complications such as pneumothorax (collapsed lung) or hemorrhage (bleeding). Complications or false testing results can in return lead to extended hospital stays along with increases in total health care costs.

The MonarchTM Platform robot utilizes a familiar controller-like interface that your doctor at the Lung Center at Penn Highlands uses to navigate a flexible robotic camera to the periphery of the lung with optimal reach, view, and control. The Monarch uses a 3D view of the patient’s own lung anatomy, providing the doctor with continuous bronchoscopic vision throughout the procedure. Better views mean greater accuracy for a timely diagnosis that could ultimately lead to a cure.

Mako SmartRobotics™

Penn Highlands Orthopedics offers joint replacements with Mako Robot, which enables surgeons to most optimally perform hip and knee replacements with as little disturbance to healthy tissues as possible, thereby delivering results to the patient with less pain and faster recovery than traditional joint replacement procedures.

Mako SmartRoboticsTM arm-assisted surgery is a new approach to hip, knee and partial knee replacement that offers the most patient-specific implant alignment and positioning. The technology enables your Penn Highlands Orthopedics surgeon to create a patient-specific 3D plan to perform joint replacement surgery using a surgeon-controlled robotic arm that helps the surgeon execute the procedure with a high degree of accuracy. Mako’s assistance in your joint replacement results in fewer and smaller incisions, less blood loss, preservation of healthy bone, less disturbance to healthy tissue, and ultimately faster recovery.

Mako’s advantages can deliver high satisfaction for you. While traditional joint replacements can sometimes require several months of recovery before a patient can return to some normal routine activities, in some cases, Mako has the potential decrease your recovery time by as much as half. Recovery after Mako may also include less swelling and pain than traditional knee replacement surgery.

da Vinci® Robotic-Assisted Surgery

da Vinci® Surgery is a type of minimally invasive surgery where our Penn Highlands surgeons use the da Vinci robotic-assisted surgical system to perform a wide range of delicate and complex operations. The da Vinci Xi System features a magnified 3D high-definition vision system and tiny wristed instruments that bend and rotate far greater than the human wrist. As a result, the da Vinci Xi System enables surgeons to operate with enhanced vision, precision, dexterity and control.

The Robotic-Assisted Surgery Program at Penn Highlands Healthcare has a multidisciplinary surgical team who are specially trained and credentialed to perform robotic-assisted da Vinci Surgery. A dedicated, highly experienced team of anesthesiologists, nurses, assistants and surgical techs are also trained to support each surgeon’s needs during robotic-assisted surgery.

Our expert surgeons use the da Vinci Robotic-Assisted Surgery System for many types of surgery, including: colorectal, general, gynecologic and urological oncology. The key potential patient benefits of da Vinci robotic-assisted surgery include:

• Shorter hospital stay
• Less blood loss
• Fewer complications
• Less need for pain medicines
• A faster recovery
• Smaller incisions associated with minimal scarring