Surgeons perform South Africa’s first robotic kidney donor surgery: Video
Surgeons at Tygerberg Hospital and Stellenbosch University have successfully performed South Africa’s first living donor kidney removal using robotic surgery.
The procedure, which involves removing a healthy kidney from a living donor for transplant, is among the most complex operations in urology. The use of a surgical robot allowed doctors to work with unprecedented precision while reducing pain and recovery time for patients.
“The vision that you have through the robot is 3D HD, but it’s up close,” explained Dr. Danelo du Plessis, urologist and senior lecturer at Tygerberg Hospital and Stellenbosch University. “You can get much closer to what you’re working on than you would with your naked eye. So it makes it much, much more safe, in my opinion. And the margin of error becomes much smaller than it would be before traditional surgery,” he further told CGTN.
Dr. du Plessis noted that living donor kidney surgery requires preserving the organ’s delicate blood vessels and ureter, the tube that connects the kidney to the bladder, with their full length and blood supply intact. This level of accuracy is now easier to achieve with robotic assistance.
South Africa faces a chronic shortage of kidney donors, particularly in the public health sector, where resources are stretched. “There is a big need for more kidney donors. But in the government sector, we don’t really have the capacity to do many more,” said Prof. Andre van der Merwe, head of Urology at Tygerberg Hospital and Stellenbosch University. “But at least if we do it like this with the robot, the efficiency is so high that the ones that we can do can be done more effectively.”
He added that robotic technology could transform how transplants are performed in the public system, making complex surgeries faster and more predictable.
This story is written and edited by the Global South World team, you can contact us here.
