ACS Fellow Performs Investigational Telesurgery Between US Hospitals

Vipul R. Patel, MD, FACS, performed a robotic prostatectomy on October 25 while stationed 35 miles from his patient, marking what is being described as the first documented robotic telesurgery between two US locations.

The 66-year-old patient underwent surgery at AdventHealth Minneola while Dr. Patel controlled the instruments from AdventHealth Celebration, Florida. The patient was doing well after surgery.

Dr. Patel, founder and medical director of AdventHealth’s Global Robotics Institute, used the investigational Toumai surgical system from MicroPort MedBot. The procedure extends a research program that previously included 10 telesurgery cases connecting Florida and Angola, bringing evaluation of the technology into the US healthcare environment.

The procedure could help researchers assess whether remote surgery might connect patients with specialized expertise closer to home. It also tests coordination between the operating surgeon and the bedside team.

Marcio Moschovas, MD, the study’s co-principal investigator, remained with the patient and surgical team in Minneola, ready to intervene. Backup systems and contingency plans were in place. Researchers are assessing surgical outcomes alongside network reliability, cybersecurity, alarms, and the performance of safeguards if equipment or connectivity fails.

The milestone builds on Dr. Patel’s June 2025 telesurgery achievement, previously reported in ACS Brief. From Florida, he performed a prostatectomy on a 67-year-old patient in Angola more than 7,000 miles away. That operation used high-speed transmission through approximately 10,000 miles of fiber optic cable, with Dr. Patel reporting no perceptible delay between his movements and the instruments’ response.

The procedure was conducted under an FDA-approved Investigational Device Exemption, which permits clinical investigation but does not constitute approval or clearance of the system for this use. Its safety and effectiveness remain under study.

This single case advances evaluation of telesurgery across institutions; it does not establish comparative outcomes or readiness for routine use.