Robots could transform breast surgery forever
Lucy De La Cruz, chief of breast surgery at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, offered Brasure the chance to be the hospital’s first patient to undergo a surgery that deployed a new robotic nipple-sparing mastectomy technique, she was enthusiastic.
Key points
- Key takeaways Every year, hundreds of thousands of women in the United States are diagnosed with breast cancer and undergo mastectomies that can leave them with little to no feeling in their chests.
- The sudden dampness came as a shock — not because it was unpleasant, but because she never expected to feel anything in that area at all, certainly not so soon after surgery.
- Normally, surgeons performed nipple-sparing mastectomies through more conventional “open” techniques, typically through a long incision at the bottom of the breast.
In December 2025, the FDA cleared the da Vinci single-port surgical system for robot-assisted breast cancer surgery, specifically nipple-sparing mastectomies.
Additional details
- The hidden surgical scar and shorter recovery period, along with the possibility of having sensation back in her breasts post-surgery, were alluring for Brasure.
- These challenges led some surgeons to explore whether a robot-assisted surgery could help mitigate certain risks of open nipple-sparing mastectomies.
- But here, De La Cruz and her team did everything through a single, 4-centimeter incision on each breast, naturally hidden under its fold.
- Some surgeons are embracing this new technology because it offers a smaller, hidden scar and a clearer view inside the breast.
- Using the da Vinci single-port robotic surgical system, she removed the breast tissue while preserving the nipples and skin.
How this summary was made: extractive summary — built from the sources' own reporting. It is drawn only from the reporting of the sources listed below — read the originals for full detail. How we summarize →
Advertisement
Every article behind this summary — 1 article from 1 outlet
Get stories like this in your inbox.
Subscribe — it's freeOne free email at 6am — your topics, deduplicated, five minutes. No account, no paywall.