Surgery robot move supported

IN RESPONSE to Tom Corby's article on robotic surgery last week, to my colleague Mr Nigel Richardson, consultant surgeon.

Many of our colleagues join me in congratulating you on acquiring the surgery robot for Mid Essex. We all know how hard it is to acquire funds from our employer, Mid Essex Hospitals, like squeezing water out of a stone.

Even the cheque presented to retiring consultants, allegedly from the trust, is in fact from the fund regularly contributed to by all consultants. However, I digress here.

I suggest that you ignore the dampened enthusiasm expressed in the local press. It is a typical British reaction. History is repeating itself after all. When Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin, the British establishment ignored it until other countries started mass producing with great economic gain.

When laparoscopic surgery was introduced, the same reaction prevailed initially. Now it is almost routine for gall bladder surgery, hernia repair, cancer surgery etc.

Let us assume an alternative scenario: It is not Mid Essex, but a neighbouring trust – we shall call it Elsewhere Trust – that acquired the robot. Guess what the local papers will write? "Elsewhere Trust has managed to acquire a million pound Da Vinci system! It means Chelmsford patients have to travel a long way to get treatment. We are so behind in medical development. What is our local trust doing? What are our local surgeons doing?"

In other words, you are damned if you do and damned if you don't. I suggest you comfort yourself with the thought "So this is how Sir Alexander Fleming felt."

Dr Cho Cho Khin