頭頸部外科領域におけるロボット支援手術

Robotic surgery is ushering in a new era in surgery by offering patients better outcomes and has already become one of the standard modalities in urology and gynecology. In the head and neck field, after the FDA clearance in 2009, transoral robotic surgery (TORS) has now been widely adopted by head and neck surgeons for treatment of benign and malignant conditions of the pharynx and larynx. Another use of surgical robots in the head and neck is thyroidectomy and neck surgery. Robotic thyroidectomy has been developed mainly by Korean surgeons and the technique has evolved into robotic neck dissection. In Japan, multi-institutional clinical study of TORS using da Vinci Surgical System had been conducted and PMDA clearance was obtained in 2018. Japan Society for Head and Neck Surgery has announced recommendations and credentials for head and neck robotic surgery in January 2019 and advance course for TORS has been held every month in Fujita Health University since May. Recent progress of surgical robots and future directions of robots and surgery in the head and neck are also discussed.