After taking a week off to recover, Dr. Shiu returned to work and believes the whole experience of being a patient has made him a more empathic physician.
On July 2, his first day of a pulmonary fellowship at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center (NBIMC), Dr. David Shiu, 29, started having debilitating and unbearable abdominal pain, accompanied by a fever and nausea that prevented him from studying for his medical boards. He was soon told he had gallstones lodged in his common bile duct and was admitted to NBIMC where he had an endoscopic procedure to alleviate the pain and was referred to robotic surgeon Adam Kopelan, MD, Chair of Surgery at NBIMC. Dr. Kopelan determined that Dr. Shiu's gall bladder had to be removed and that he was a candidate for single-site cholesystectomy, a minimally invasive robotic procedure performed through the belly button that leaves no scars and reduces recovery time.
Although Dr. Shiu was a patient through the Fourth of July holiday, watching and hearing fireworks from his hospital bed, the next day Dr. Kopelan, one of only a few surgeons in New Jersey trained to perform the procedure, performed the robotic surgery and discharged Dr. Shiu just three hours after the procedure. After taking a week off to recover, Dr. Shiu returned to work and believes the whole experience of being a patient has made him a more empathic physician.
Sophisticated robotic precision technology entirely controlled by the surgeon at the console enables patients like Dr. Shiu to return to normal activities quickly and without the scars that often follow laparoscopic or traditional surgical procedures.
Ask your doctor about Single-Site surgery if you have been told you need gallbladder surgery.