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Sep 19, 2008 5:45 pm US/Eastern

Robotic Surgery Can Preserve A Woman's Fertility

Uterine Fibroids Are Benign (Non-Cancerous) Tumors Occurring In At Least One Quarter Of All Women

WESTON (CBS4) ― Although some women with uterine fibroid tumors have to have a hysterectomy, a robotic myomectomy is providing other women an opportunity to retain their uterus and subsequently, retain their fertility.

Overwhelming pelvic pain was having a major impact on 34-year old Angie Whitson, affecting her work and relationship with her newlywed husband.
She said, "It was to the point almost where I didn't want to do anything."
This past June, the Sunrise resident learned the reason for her pain  was uterine fibroids; they're muscle tumors, actually, they're benign muscle tumors of the uterus and they tend to grow over a woman's lifetime.
Dr. Stephen Zimberg with the Cleveland Clinic in Weston explained that Whitson's fibroids were the size of several golf balls.  In  her case, surgery was the best option.
She could have chosen a hysterectomy or embolization, but both would have left her unable to have children.
Angie said, "We had a 50/50 chance of having a hysterectomy, and that wasn't our option because if we choose to have kids, we want it to be our decision to have kids or not to have kids."
So Whitson decided to try a new procedure - a robot-assisted myomectomy - that would preserve her fertility. The robotic arm can move 180-degrees, so it actually has more movement than your own hand.
Dr. Zimberg commented, "The advantage of the robot is it allows us to do much bigger fibroids that we would have to normally open up a patient for which means a 4-6 week recovery."
The other benefits include shorter hospital stays, less pain, less risk of infection and overall quicker recovery.  Robot-assisted surgery requires only three small incisions the size of a fingertip.
For Whitson, the surgery significantly improved her life and she doesn't even worry the fibroids could return.

(© MMVIII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

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