Key Initiative
Healthcare
Location
Hong Kong
Year
2014 - 2018
Funded By
Chow Tai Fook Charity Foundation
Medical TechnologyRobotic Surgical System

Dr. Cheng Yu-tung Robotic Arm Surgery Rooms

In 2014, with the support from Chow Tai Fook Charity Foundation (the Foundation), the Hospital Authority introduced Asia’s first duo-console, fourth-generation “da Vinci Robotic System” at Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Rotating 270 degrees, the advanced robotic arm enables doctors to perform more delicate excisions and sutures from wider angles. The new system also features laser positioning which helps reduce surgery time, together with full high definition 3D imaging, it allows doctors to perform complex surgeries more precisely with less damage to nearby nerves. 

More than 150 patients benefit from this advanced equipment every year. As the system only requires a small incision, the healing time is much shorter than conventional surgeries and the success rate is much higher. Besides, the patient’s recovery time after the minimally invasive surgeries is shorter and the results are better. 

In addition, the duo-console design of the system allows two surgeons to perform complex surgeries at the same time. Senior surgeons can also leverage it to train young surgeons in using new techniques, helping to raise the overall surgical standard in Hong Kong. Aside from Queen Elizabeth Hospital, the Foundation also supported the acquisition of the surgery system at Prince of Wales Hospital in 2017 and Queen’s Mary Hospital in 2018 respectively.

Compared with the conventional system, the new system is equipped with a number of advanced features such as a multi-angle robotic arm that allows 270-degree rotation, as well as 3D imaging and a dual-console system. It not only enables a change from the previous surgical approach in which patients had to accommodate the equipment, but also improves surgical safety and speeds up surgical progresses. Besides, the dual-console design of the system allows two doctors to operate the robotic arm at the same time

Dr. Ho Lap-Yin
Consultant
Department of Surgery, Queen Elizabeth Hospital

In the past, the urinary catheter could not be removed from the patient until two or three weeks after the rectal surgery. But now, with the new system in place, it can be removed within a few days after the surgery is finished. In addition, the very small incisions made possible by using the robotic arm can avoid nerve injury

Dr. Kwok Kam-Hung
Consultant
Colorectal Practice, Department of Surgery, Queen Elizabeth Hospital

I could get off from bed and walk three to four days after the surgery and was discharged from the hospital after seven days. I am very satisfied with the recovery after the surgery

Mr. Chow
Patient suffered from prostate cancer who was the first to underwent the surgery performed by the new system in February 2015

The wound was completely painless and the recovery process was speedy."

Ms. Ho
Patient suffering from rectal cancer who underwent the surgery with the new system in October 2015