Dr Marius Bongers, who undertook the procedure late last year, said it involved the successful removal of a cancerous tumour. Since then, five more successful robotic partial nephrectomies have been undertaken at the hospital.

“The robot-assisted partial nephrectomy was a success,” said Bongers of the first procedure. “The tumour, although moderately difficult to access due to its location, was removed. There was no significant bleeding and there was a much shorter time in restriction of blood supply to the surrounding tissues,” said Dr Bongers.

The procedure was conducted with the minimally invasive and state-of-the-art robotic surgical system, resulting in less pain and less blood loss than open surgery, as well as a faster recovery time.

Robotic surgery was introduced in SA for the first time two years ago at The Urology Hospital which has since successfully completed about 500 prostatectomies (removal of cancerous prostate).

One of the world’s leading experts on robotics, Dr Vip Patel, visited The Urology Hospital recently and said SA was on the cusp of a revolution in cancer treatment due to the introduction of robotic surgery.

• See a video clip of the da Vinci robotic surgical system as broadcast on MNET’s Carte Blanche here: http://bit.ly/1VYKqjX

• See a video clip of the da Vinci robotic surgical system on CCTV below: