In Minnesota, a local news article touted a new robotic surgery for total hip replacements at a nearby hospital. The article noted surgeons were relying less on the imperfect human eye and fallible human hand and instead leaning on the precision of robots.
The latest investment for the local surgical center costs millions of dollars. It’s an arm-assisted system, and promises to “take the guesswork” out of placement of hip replacement implants, allowing patients to receive fits that are customized. It’s one of two surgical centers in that state to use the robotic arm system, which was manufactured by Stryker – the same company at the center of hip replacement and knee replacement litigation for defective products.
Approximately 400 to 550 hip replacements are done at this surgical center alone each year. The hope is to reduce the number of additional surgeries sometimes needed to correct improper placement of hip replacements, which is largely attributed to “eyeballing techniques” used by surgeons to get the parts in the right place.