They may sound like an odd couple, but da Vinci and McSleepy are a robotic surgical dream team.
In what's being billed as a world first, the two robots worked together in a Montreal hospital to perform a fully automated prostate operation while a surgeon and an anaesthesiologist manned workstations nearby.
Dr. Armen Aprikian, the chief urologist at the McGill University Health Centre, controlled the da Vinci machine during the delicate procedure last week.
Anaesthesiologist Dr. Thomas Hemmerling focused on vital signs and artificial ventilation while McSleepy anaesthetized and monitored the 68-year-old patient.
The robot doc team have called the vanguard surgery a success and Hemmerling - who helped develop McSleepy over two years ago - said he was impressed with how smoothly the demanding procedure went.
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