To ensure the most precise spinal surgery possible,
Hoag is the first hospital on the West Coast to offer a new technology platform
that combines computerized navigation with robotic surgery, increasing
accuracy, reducing recovery time and improving outcomes.
The ExcelsiusGPS™ provides real-time, detailed visualization throughout
a procedure to help ensure spinal surgery success. The system streamlines
surgery, reduces overall radiation exposure to the patient, surgeon and
staff, and minimizes pain and recovery time after surgery.
“This revolutionary technology provides our patients and clinical
team with the most technologically advanced minimally invasive treatment
option available,” said Burak Ozgur, M.D., chief of service for
the Neurosurgery Spine Program at the Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute
at Hoag. “This robotic instrument still allows the surgeon to be
in complete control, but gives them the added benefit of 3D guided navigation
in one easy-to-use tool.”
Hoag has received numerous national, state and local accolades for its
success with robotic-assisted, minimally invasive surgery, as well as
being named one of the
Top 100 Hospitals & Health Systems with Great Neurosurgery and Spine Programs for 2017 by
Becker’s Hospital Review.
Hoag has shown repeatedly how minimally invasive surgery can result in
less blood loss, reduced muscle damage and faster recovery times. For
patients, this has made all the difference.
“I am very active, and I have been able to return to all the things
that are important to me,” said Judy Digon, who broke her back twice
and underwent minimally invasive surgery with Dr. Ozgur in 2017. “I
was in chronic pain, my pain never let up, never stopped. Now I do have
some pain, but it is very manageable. I feel better about life. I’m
able to sit, able to sleep on my side. Dr. Ozgur has given me back a quality
of life that I thought was gone permanently.”
Robotic platforms, many funded by philanthropy, are important tools throughout
Hoag’s specialized services. Advanced computer-assisted technology
is becoming the standard of care in cancer,women’s health, cardiovascular
conditions and general surgery. By introducing this technology to spine
neurosurgery, Hoag is upholding its commitment to improving outcomes for
patients through continued innovation.
“We continue to invest in these state-of-the-art tools because our
patients expect and deserve the best and latest technology that medicine
has to offer,” said Michael Brant-Zawadzki, M.D., F.A.C.R., senior
physician executive and the Ron & Sandi Simon Executive Medical Director
Endowed Chair of the Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute, Hoag.
In the coming months, Hoag will also serve as a training facility for surgeons
across the country that want to observe and train in spine procedures
using the ExcelsiusGPS. One of the benefits that surgeons find is that
the new ExcelsiusGPS platform allows surgeons to work using the preoperative
scans, reducing the need for intraoperative radiation exposure while providing
the detailed imaging road map that allows for precision and success.
“By enhancing the safety and accuracy of robotic-assisted, minimally
invasive spine surgery, we are able to offer patients a level of precision
that no other hospital on the West Coast can,” Dr. Ozgur said.
For more information on the Providence St. Joseph Health Network, email
foremployers@stjoe.org.
Article originally appeared in
Hoag for Life, Spring 2018.