Robotic Assisted Laparoscopic Hysterectomy

In 1495 Leonardo Da Vinci designed what was to be the first automated humanoid and it is speculated that this was to be for the entertainment of royalty. It is not known whether an actual prototype was ever built. The word robot was first introduced by the Czech writer Karel Capek in his play Rossum’s Universal Robots (R.U.R) in 1920. The Czech word robota means labor or servitude. The play takes place on an island where the robot factory is producing robots to be sold to the world as cheap labor. The robots turn around and try to take over the world and end the human race. Isaac Asimov wrote a sequence of short stories in 1940 on the difficulties that would be faced if autonomous robots populated the Earth. He laid 3 laws of robotics which state “(the first law) A robot may not injure a human being, or through inaction allow a human being to come to harm, (the second law) A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with First Law and (the third law) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First and Second Law”. As his writings became more intricate and complex, so did the relationship between man and robot. He then felt the need to add another law which was more basic and more important than the first three which he then called the zeroth law “A robot may not injure humanity, or through inaction, allow humanity to come to harm”. This gave a broader picture of the laws governing robots. Robotic technology is now incorporated into our everyday life which can range from the large manufacturing assembly lines to everyday household chores. The field of Medicine is no exception where robotic applications are gaining momentum. One of the first robotic applications came from the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab (SAIL) in 1969. They designed a robotic arm with 6 degrees of freedom (6-dof) all-electric mechanical manipulator exclusively for computer control. The Stanford Arm and SAIL helped to develop the knowledge base which has been applied in essentially all the industrial robots. The first commercially available robotic system was the ROBODOC which was used for orthopedic surgery. AESOP was designed to allow the surgeon greater control over visualization and to eliminate the need for an assistant holding the scope. The ZEUS robot was then developed which had a two-dimensional imaging system. Intuitive Surgical Inc (Intuitive Surgical Inc, Moutain View, CA) developed the Da Vinci robotic system and the first successful surgery was performed in 1997 in Belgium. The Da Vinci Robotic system is now also utilized by gynecologists to perform a number of procedures including hysterectomy myomectomy, tubal reversal and sacrocolpopexy as