A surgical technique.
Using [fibre optic]? technology, video cameras (videoscopic procedures using a laparoscope or endoscope) and long, thin instruments the size of incision a surgeon? needs to see what he is doing can be reduced. Rather than a 20cm cut in a cholecystectomy? a number of 5-15 mm cuts can be sufficient, the abdomen is insufflated and the endoscopic camera is put in through the navel and the instruments through small incisions.
This approach hopefully minimises operative blood loss, post-operative pain, and speeds recovery times. However the restricted vision, difficult handling of the instruments (hand-eye coordination ), lack of tactile perception and the limited working area can increase the possibility of damage to surrounding organs and vessels, either accidently or through the difficultly of procedures.
History
The first endoscope, of a kind, was developed in 1806 by Philip Bozzini but sucha device was not introduced into a human until 1853. Of limited utility even in diagnosis the procedure was named laparothorakoskopie in 1911. Its use in the diagnosis of liver and gallbladder disease was extented by the German Heinz Kalk in the 1930s. Its diagnostic use in gynaecology is dated from the 1940s and Raoul Palmer, who placed his patients in the [Trendelemburg position]? so air could inflate the pelvic area. Laparoscopic surgery did not begin until the late 1970s and then only with young and 'healty' patients. By 1980 laparoscopy training was required by obstetrics and gynecology. The first laparoscopic cholecystectomy was performed in 1984 and the first video-laparoscopic cholecystectomy in 1987. During the 1990s laparoscopic surgery was extended to the appendix, spleen, colon, stomach, kidney, and liver and robotic assistance was introduced.
![[Home]](wikipedia.png)