King's College London

This less invasive approach, known as transoral robotic surgery (TORS), can remove cancerous and benign tumours growing in the mouth and throat and speed up the patient’s recovery time. The technique is well established but has never been performed with this newer surgical robot.

The Versius robot has previously been used to treat urology patients, but as part of a research study by Guy’s and St Thomas’ (GSTT) and King’s College London, it has now been used for TORS.

The configuration of Versius to be able to operate through the mouth was made possible thanks to a PhD study by head and neck research fellow Jack Faulkner, supervised by Mr Asit Arora, robotic head and neck surgery lead at GSTT and Professor Sebastien Ourselin, Head of School of Biomedical Engineering and Imaging Sciences at King’s College London. It was a project that brought together clinical, academic and industry partners.

Jack said: “The main consideration is we work in a much smaller environment so all the instruments have to pass through the mouth and be located closer together. It’s more challenging to use robotic systems in that space."

The Versius robotic system, consists of four modular robotic arms and is designed and built in Cambridge by CMR Surgical. During a robotic procedure, surgeons control the robotic instruments while sitting at an open console in the same room with a 3D HD view. One of the robotic arms controls a camera, to see inside the patient.

Mr Arora pioneered TORS in the UK in 2009 with a different robotic system, and now teaches robotic surgery to clinicians across the country and Europe. He said: “Going through the mouth with a robotic system allows surgeons to safely operate in a tight, small space which is surrounded by important blood vessels and nerves.

For some patients, the minimally invasive approach can mean they need smaller doses of further treatments like radiotherapy or chemotherapy, or it may result in them avoiding the need for additional treatments altogether.