Students get hands-on experience with surgical robot

Students at Chelsea High School were given the opportunity to get a hands-on experience with the DaVinci surgical system during the Shelby Baptist Medical Center Day on April 14. 

The $2.4 million Intuitive DaVinci robotic-assisted surgical system was on display at the Chelsea High School Healthcare Academy. Shelby Baptist Medical Center physicians and staff were on hand to provide medical education and demonstrations. 

Students were also able to have hands-on simulation experiences with the robot during the school day, and a community-wide open house was held after school for parents, students, teachers, administrators, and school nurses from all Shelby County Schools, along with members of the community.

The event was an industry partnership between Shelby County Schools, Shelby Baptist Medical Center and Intuitive Surgical. 

Andrea Maddox, instructor of the Healthcare Academy said the day prior to the event, surgeons were using the robot before it made its way to Chelsea High School. The program at CHS is part of Shelby County School's Career Technical Education.

“It’s just been a great day of learning, demonstration and partnerships,” she said. “This robot was at the Marriott at Grandview yesterday training surgeons and they brought it over here for our kids today.”

Students in the Chelsea Healthcare Academy were excited to be part of the event and get to operate the robot. 

“Using the Da Vinci robot was a surreal experience,” said Rylee Speed. “You hear it get talked about, but actually sitting there being able to operate it’s an entirely different world.”

Jessie Holsombeck said she had seen the robot in a real surgery at Shelby Baptist, and enjoyed having a hands-on experience. 

“I got to observe at Shelby Baptist was on a prostate removal with the robot,” she said. “Seeing it here and being able to use it is really cool. Being able to sit where the surgeon sits and see what the surgeon sees was really surreal.”

The robot's technology is ideal for many types of surgical procedures and the doctors can guide patients through the process. 

Dr. Charles Braswell, a general surgeon at Shelby Baptist, said the hospital has been performing robotic surgeries since 2013. He said it can be used for a variety of surgeries, including hernia, gallbladder, prostate, gynecological surgeries, cardiothoracic surgery and any colon or stomach operation. 

Braswell went to the Intuitive lab in Atlanta to train on the Da Vinci model. It only took him a short time to learn how to work the machine. “It’s just like shrinking down my hands,” he said. 

“It was nothing because I knew how to do everything openly, I wasn't learning anything new,” he said. “It’s just like shrinking down my hands.”

The robot offers a minimally invasive approach to surgery, but doesn’t do anything independently. Benefits to patients include experiencing less pain, less blood loss, less infection and scarring, less use of pain medicine after surgery, a shorter or no hospital stay, faster recovery and a faster return to work.