Committee Opinion No. 628

Abstract

The field of robotic surgery has developed rapidly, and its use for gynecologic conditions has grown exponentially. Surgeons should be skilled at abdominal and laparoscopic approaches for a specific procedure before undertaking robotic approaches. Surgeon training, competency guidelines, and quality metrics should be developed at the institutional level. Robot-assisted cases should be appropriately selected based on the available data and expert opinion. As with any surgical procedure, repetition drives competency. Ongoing quality assurance is essential to ensure appropriate use of the technology and, most importantly, patient safety. Adoption of new surgical techniques should be driven by what is best for the patient, as determined by evidence-based medicine rather than external pressures. Well-designed randomized controlled trials or comparably rigorous nonrandomized prospective trials are needed to determine which patients are likely to benefit from robot-assisted surgery and to establish the potential risks.