Yesterday, I wrote up an analyst report about Intuitive Surgical (ISRG) touting the company’s da Vinci surgical system–a report that appeared to have helped pushed the stock up 4.7%.
One of my readers left a comment that I’ll cite here in full:
Davinci surgeons do not scrub up for the console, so the picture choice is curious. They watched presentations and then made investment pronouncements. Yikes. The presentations likely emphasize safety to try to counter all the recent publicity. This gave these casual analysts the impression that davinci is safe. lol.
Well, wouldn’t you know it–Bloomberg ran a story this morning with the headline, “Robot Surgery Damaging Patients Rises With Marketing.” The nearly three-thousand word article describes in detail what my reader was hinting at: Robotic surgery hasn’t been all that safe. From the Bloomberg article:
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Porter Adventist Hospital in Denver announced last year that Warren Kortz, a general surgeon on the medical staff, was the first in the Rocky Mountain region to use a technique known as robotic surgery to remove gall bladders through one incision in the belly button…
What the hospital and Kortz didn't reveal was the risk. Even as Kortz promoted robotic surgery, 10 patients he treated suffered injuries or complications between 2008 and 2011, according to an April complaint by the Colorado Medical Board. Five had arteries punctured or torn. Objects were temporarily left inside two, and others had nerve damage. One died and another needed cardiopulmonary resuscitation. The complaint charges Kortz with 14 counts of unprofessional conduct, including sometimes not advising patients on alternatives to the robot.
Robotic surgeries are on the rise, fueled by aggressive marketing by doctors, hospitals and Intuitive Surgical Inc., which manufactures the $1.5 million robot. Advertising on hospital and doctor websites, YouTube videos, billboards, and on radio and television has hyped the advantages of robotic surgeries, often claimed fewer complications without proof, and ignored contradictory studies finding no advantage in some cases.
It’s well worth reading the rest of the article to get a full sense of that marketing push.
Intuitive Surgical has gained 4.3% to $397.20 today, easily trumping the gains in other healthcare-equipment companies. Covidien (COV) has ticked down 0.3% to $60.08, Medtronic (MDT) has gained 0.5% to $52.97, Abbott Laboratories (ABT) has fallen 0.8% to $33.24, and C.R. Bard (BCR) is little changed at $114.52.
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