Apollo Hospitals, Chennai, has successfully performed a robotic head-and-neck surgery on a 49-year-old woman to remove a large tumour of 8cm size on her salivary gland without leaving any scar on her neck, a first of its kind surgery in the country.
The surgery was performed by Dr Venkat Karthikeyan C, Clinical lead of Robotic ENT Head and Neck Oncology at Apollo Main Hospital, which has also completed 125 such surgeries, Apollo Hospitals said in a statement. Speaking about the breakthrough surgery, Dr Venkat Karthikeyan said, “The woman (Vijayalaxmi) arrived at Apollo Hospitals with a large tumour visible on the right side of her neck. This is the first time in the country a robotic RAHI-approached surgery was performed to remove a tumour of size 8cm on the submandibular gland, especially, without leaving a scar on the neck.
“The Robotic head-and-neck surgery is an evolving subspecialty in the field of ENT which is classified as Trans Oral Robotic Surgery (TORS) for cancers of the throat and Retroauricular Hairline incision (RAHI) approach for tumours on the neck without any visible scars. This approach facilitates endoscopic neck surgeries under higher magnification and better cosmesis, leaving no scars in the visible portion of the neck,” Karthikeyan added.
This is an ideal treatment for young and socially-active members of society who need treatment for tumours of the thyroid, parathyroid glands, parapharyngeal space tumours, submandibular gland removal, benign neck swellings like the branchial cleft cyst and neck dissection for metastatic cervical lymph nodes in patients with head and neck cancers.