For more than a decade, robot-assisted surgery has been a consistent trend in hospitals and health systems across the country. This shows no signs of slowing down. The benefits of leveraging robots – wisely, cost-effectively, and for the surgical procedures that truly need them — can be many and far-reaching. Average ROI looks like a 16% increase in robot utilization and a 15% decrease of non-robotic cases in robot rooms.
To achieve these results, however, ORs must have access to complete, unbiased data that reveals all the information they need to make the right choices about robot utilization.
Determining the right robot utilization for lower cost
Robots are costly. The purchase price of a single robot can be up to $2.5 million, with annual maintenance fees of $100,000 and disposable instrument costs of $200 per instrument per case. Leasing robots instead of buying them mitigates costs to an extent, but can also lead to undue expense if the OR pays per use. To derive value from these costs, ORs must fully utilize their robots within clearly defined and appropriate parameters.
When used for complex procedures like neurosurgeries, robotic surgery methods make an enormous difference to surgeon and patient experience, and efficiency for better department operations. Robots can make performing invasive, complex procedures minimally invasive, lower-risk for patients, and reduced cost to hospitals due to shorter length of stays. For these reasons, robot cases like neurosurgeries or cardiac surgeries are good targets for case volume growth.
In some cases, such as less invasive procedures like appendectomies, using robotic rather than laparoscopic or other surgical methods adds no significant benefit, entails increased costs of equipment, and blocks the use of the robot for cases that need it. Especially in settings where robots are leased and ORs pay per use, operational leaders must be able to pre-determine that robots are only used where necessary, which may be limited to certain service lines or procedures.
The right robot access can benefit surgeons, patients, and the OR
- For Surgeons
Access to the right robots for the right cases can mean performing more cases and enjoying a more ergonomic experience while performing them. It can also offer opportunities to practice new procedure types and develop skills. All these contribute to helping surgeons strategically grow their careers and practices.
- For Patients
Undergoing robot-assisted surgery can mean less recovery time, reduced length of stay for inpatient cases, and better outcomes overall. Robotic cardiac surgeries have shown lower mortality rates than traditional cardiac surgeries. Certain colectomies or prostate surgeries, performed with robotic methods, can lead to less blood loss, lower pain levels, and a higher chance of “textbook outcomes”, or minimal complications, for patients.
Better robot utilization impacts the whole OR, hospital, and health system
Hospitals who can fully utilize a robot they purchased, to the point additional purchases can be delayed, can decrease capital expenditures. For those who lease robots per-use, ensuring the robot is used only for appropriate cases saves significant cost. The reduced length of stay and better clinical outcomes that result from optimal robot use also counterweigh the cost of buying, leasing, and maintaining robots.
High robot efficiency further promotes staff efficiency in robot rooms, supporting optimized workforce resources and higher case volumes. This increased robot volume delivers another competitive advantage, as non-employed surgeons are motivated to perform wherever they can access needed robot time. Offering this time helps hospitals attract even more surgical volume.
With more cases being performed in the OR, driving key revenue and improved patient access, the entire health system has the opportunity to not only survive financial and operational constraints, but thrive and succeed. This is only possible if OR leaders have access to the complete, unbiased data that drives wise decisions about the best use of robots given their circumstances and case mixes.
To learn more about how to obtain and deploy this data, see our recent whitepaper published with Becker’s Healthcare.
