LAVH vs. RALH

I'm torn...Why choose RALH vs. LAVH? Please tell me which one you had and why you chose it over the other.

TIA!

I had DaVinci because it was the only minimally invasive surgery for cancer. I am sooooooo blessed to have had everything removed (including lymph nodes) and the surgical staging done this way. The surgeon removed my uterus, etc. through the vagina, so there was no cutting up or grinding of anything.

The biggest concerns I had were efficacy in treating my cancer, safety (most accurate and fewest complications), lowest recovery time, and least chance of my abdominal muscles not healing right and preventing me from ever doing my job again.

My surgeon has done DaVinci for years and does them all the time, so I was in very skilled and experienced hands. Regardless of what kind of surgery you have, who you have for your surgery is very, very important because if s/he botches it, you are the one that suffers. If things go wrong, the surgery could convert to an abdominal, with the attendant concerns of abdominal surgery. One of the most imporant questions to ask your surgeon is his or her rate of conversions from the kind of surgery you are considering/going to have to abdominal. The lower the better, if you are trying to avoid abdominal.

According to the DaVinci website:

4% of DaVincis end up abdominal, while 20% of laproscopic end up abdominal;

2% of DaVincis have complications, 2% of laproscopic have complications, and 17.2 % of abdominal have complications;

Estimated blood loss for DaVinci is 61.1 ml, for laproscopic is 113.0 ml, and for abdominal is 305.1 ml;

Average hospital stay for Davinci is 1.1 days, for laproscopic is 1.6 days, and for abdominal is 6.0 days;

Average time for the procedure for DaVinci is 78.7 minutes, for laproscopic is 92.4 minutes, and for abdominal is 86.1 minutes.

The DaVinci website http://www.davincihysterectomy.com references scientific studies published in peer-reviewed journals. Note that this site is published by Intuitive Surgical, Inc., who makes the DaVinci surgical system.

In my previous post, I forgot to list what I consider to be the two most important questions to ask your surgeon. Regardless of which surgery you are considering/going to have, make sure you ask how many of that kind of surgery s/he has performed and does in an average week/month. The more experience, generally, the better. As an example, in one of the articles referenced on the DaVinci site, the time for the DaVinci procedure was vastly less after a doctor had done 25 of them...

Hi ixn89



One of the benefits of the davinci system is the ability of the instruments to see behind organs (because of the rotating "wrists"). For women with cancer and endometriosis, this is especially helpful because the surgeon is able to see even more of what needs to be removed.

You're smart to be asking questions in order to make the best decision possible for yourself. If you'd like more information, you might want to take a look at our da Vinci FAQ.

Thank You soooooo much for your replies.