2008
Robotic Prostate Cancer Surgery Performed On Two Brothers, Just Hours Apart
“We are blessed to have each other to depend on. If you have to go through something bad like cancer, you’re glad to have a friend to go through it with,” said one of two brothers from Savannah, Georgia recovering from robotic prostate cancer surgery. The two siblings flew to The Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York to have lifesaving surgery on the same day this week. Dr. David B. Samadi, M.D., Chief of Robotics and Minimally Invasive Surgery in the Department of Urology at Mount Sinai successfully performed the robotic prostate cancer surgeries on the siblings one after another on Monday, January 14th, 2008.
“The brothers have benefited physically and even emotionally as a result of having their prostatectomy with the da Vinci robotic technology at Mount Sinai together,” said Dr. Samadi. “Each minimally invasive surgery was an hour and twenty minutes which included only a few tiny incisions, limited blood loss (50 CC), no need for blood transfusions, less pain, and a faster recovery which included each of the patients walking the next day and were released from the hospital two days after surgery.”
Also, along with the help of Microvascular and Plastic Surgeon Dr. Jess Ting, M.D. of the Department of Surgery, the doctors were able to preserve each patient’s sexual function after robotic surgery by implanting a nerve graft extracted from each patient’s leg. “I will still be a normal person after robotic surgery, with feeling of all nerves because of the graft,” said one brother.