As reported in the New York Post, a man in the United States has sued a medical manufacturer, alleging that the company’s surgical robot killed his wife by burning a hole in her organs during an operation to cure her colon cancer.
According to the lawsuit, the robot burned a hole in her small intestine, necessitating further medical care.
Harvey Sultzer, Sandra Sultzer’s husband, filed a complaint against Intuitive Surgical on February 6, 2024, claiming that his wife’s health problems were caused by a surgery that was carried out by their surgical robot.
The lawsuit claims that the woman underwent surgery in September 2021 at Baptist Health Boca Raton Regional Hospital to treat her colon cancer using the multi-armed, remote-controlled da Vinci robot.
“To enable precision beyond the limits of the human hand,” according to the business, the device is “designed to provide surgeons with natural dexterity while operating through small incisions,” enabling for less invasive treatments.
Ms. Sultzer passed away in February 2022 “as a direct and proximate result of the injuries she suffered” following the surgery, the lawsuit claims.
According to the lawsuit, the business was aware that the robot had insulation problems that would affect the internal organs but chose not to tell the family.
The business has been notified of hundreds of incidents involving accidents and malfunctions connected to the robot, it continued. To the Food and Drug Administration, they have, nevertheless, “underreported” these.
The company is accused in the case of selling its robots to hospitals with little experience doing robotic surgery and of failing to provide physicians with sufficient training on the da Vinci system.
“$75,000 for negligence, product liability, including design defect and failure to warn, loss of consortium and punitive damages,” is the amount that Mr. Sultzer is suing IS for.
The da Vinci system, which IS unveiled in 1999, was among the first surgical robots. The gadget has been accused of multiple defects since it was approved by the FDA a year later.
