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What does robotic prostatectomy look like? Is it like a vasectomy?
Prostate Cancer | Last Active: Aug 16 4:52pm | Replies (13)Comment receiving replies
White 5-6 port (incision) RP is still common place, the "industry" is moving to the DaVinci "single incision" Robotic-assisted Radical Prostatectomy. I had the DaVinci single-incision procedure. My urologist only does single-incision procedure. My incision (a.k.a "scar") is about 2 1/2 inches wide, and about 2 1/2" below my navel. I have no reference, of course, for the outcome of the 5-6 incision multi-port procedure, but I can tell you that the single-incision is no cakewalk. No matter the means of surgery, this is a major surgery. Thank God for Percocet...I felt assaulted, pummeled, and beat down below my navel for most of the 10 days that my catheter was in. At day #5-6, I was wondering if I'd be able to drive to my catheter removal appointment (I was able, but not super-comfortable). When my urologist told me he does the single-incision DaVinci procedure, I saw the logic: why suffer 5-6 incisions and scars, when one incision accomplishes the same thing? Having just written that makes me want to investigate a comparison of surgical outcomes of the 5-6 incision vs single-incision methods. Either way, they take your prostate, but maybe one is actually better.
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Results are the same and pain is the same and pain level is very individual as it is with any surgery. There are people with minimal discomfort and people that need strong pain medication after this or any other medical procedure. There are people that need Percocet after tooth extrication, and people that did not need anything but Tylenol and Ibuprofen after RARP for the first 3 days. It is all very individual and does not necessarily relates to a technique used.
Also, if RP is pretty straightforward it will cause less bleeding and trauma to the pelvic area in comparison to RP that involves big prostate, cancer that spread outside of the gland margins and/or involves lymph-node removal, etc.
Pain level will also be more pronounced in older patients, or patients that in general are not very fit or are overweight.
My husband's surgeon performs both kinds to RARP but we opted for multi-port since that technique offers better maneuverability, especially for posterior location of a tumor.
All in all, no surgery is "minor" and every kind of surgery can be "major" depending of any particular case and of a patient and also of surgeon's skill.