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Speaker 1: Health matters. We're seeing big demand for our surgical robotics program.

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Speaker 1: So Wakefield Hospitals in the Capital, of course, just completed

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Speaker 1: its eight hundredth procedure, which is a two hundred percent

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Speaker 1: increase in the last couple of years. Michael Quirk is

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Speaker 1: the CEO of Evolution Healthcare Hospitals and as with us, Michael,

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Speaker 1: morning to.

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Speaker 2: You go it, Mike, great to be here. Thanks.

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Speaker 1: How much more efficient is a robot than a surgeon?

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Speaker 2: Yes, good question. Look, the efficiencies are increasingly being found

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Speaker 2: as the technology develops. So the robots aren't for all

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Speaker 2: procedures by any stretch, but for those that it has

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Speaker 2: been working on over a number of years and indeed decades.

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Speaker 2: Now the new generation robots are seeing much better efficiencies,

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Speaker 2: they're less invasive, and most importantly, the enhanced outcomes. Excuse

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Speaker 2: me that we're now seeing an outstanding result for both

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Speaker 2: the patients and the broader health system.

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Speaker 1: Really what sort of procedures and the number of procedures

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Speaker 1: not numerically, but the range of increasing and dramatically.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, initially we saw a lot of urology work

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Speaker 2: being the sort of the initial for a for this robots.

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Speaker 2: But what we've seen since is a move into general surgery, gynecology,

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Speaker 2: set and neck, and the E and T and it's

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Speaker 2: even in cardiac surgery now as well. So as you

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Speaker 2: can see the expanding ability of these robots as the

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Speaker 2: new generations come along just means more and more. This

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Speaker 2: has been part of our health system that we need

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Speaker 2: to adopt.

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Speaker 1: Does the risk profile change at all in the same

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Speaker 1: operation using an old team versus a machine?

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Speaker 2: No, it doesn't. And look, these robots are only being

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Speaker 2: deployed when the risk profile is actually safer for the patient.

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Speaker 2: And again we have those enhanced health outcomes which medical

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Speaker 2: literature is increasingly showing, and that's what's driving the mood

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Speaker 2: to these robots.

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Speaker 1: How do people handle it? Because it would most people

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Speaker 1: going into at some point of medical contact, they'll go, right,

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Speaker 1: you're having this proceed and by the way, it's a robot.

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Speaker 1: Do people freak out?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Look, look there's definitely apprehension for some of our patients.

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Speaker 2: We always walk them through just what the surgery is

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Speaker 2: going to be. And when you walk into the theater

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Speaker 2: and you understand that the console itself where the surgeon

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Speaker 2: is not next to the theater table where the patient

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Speaker 2: is That can be a bit jarring for some, but

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Speaker 2: ultimately the pre op education that we do and the

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Speaker 2: assurances that we give and the outcomes that we can

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Speaker 2: now show mean that the patients are always prepared and yeah,

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Speaker 2: undergo surgery from there?

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Speaker 1: Where is the doctor? Because what I'm fascinated and is

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Speaker 1: robotics versus remote So, in other words, the doctors in

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Speaker 1: Timbukti and you're in Auckland versus the doctor being in

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Speaker 1: the next room.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, good question. Look, the console is in the theater itself.

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Speaker 2: The robot, the robot with its multiple arms are set

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Speaker 2: up over the patient via ports and most commonly this

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Speaker 2: will be within the patients abdomen for general surgery, urology

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Speaker 2: and gynecology and the like. But the surgeon himself or

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Speaker 2: herself will be at the side of the room and

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Speaker 2: I'll be able to see the room and be controlling

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Speaker 2: the theater with the theater team around, and the innethetist

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Speaker 2: will be at the head of the patient as well.

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Speaker 1: Good stuff, mate, I'm nice and so I appreciate it

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Speaker 1: very much. Michael Quirk's fascinating area, isn't it robotics and

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Speaker 1: technology and all that sort of stuff. Anyway, chief executive

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Speaker 1: officer of Evolution Healthcare Hospitals.

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