The Foundation will offer 12-month fellowship to two selected cancer surgeons specialising in Urology, Gynaecology to train as Robotic Surgeons as an understudy to a Robotic Surgeon at Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai and Apollo Hospital, Chennai.
“After completing the fellowship, we expect them to become accomplished Robotic Surgeons capable of handling procedures independently,” says Dr. Mahendra Bhandari, CEO, Vattikuti Foundation
The Foundation had called for applications for 4 Fellowships in Robotic Surgery at Fortis Heart Research Institute, Delhi; Amrita Hospital, Kochi; Manipal Hospitals, Bangalore and Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute, New Delhi in June 2016.
The selection procedure is underway and the names will be announced in early August 2016.
Vattikuti Foundation has committed to offer 100 paid fellowships to super specialist surgeons in India to become Robotic surgeons.
Vattikuti Foundation runs a medical student engagement program where identified Vattikuti Scholars (with a post graduate degree in surgery and a super specialization) are exposed to webinars and participation in Robotic Surgeons Council meets.
In the last 5 years, multi-disciplinary Robotic Surgery has established its value in India with documented superior patient outcomes and efficacy.
The Vattikuti Foundation has helped expand Robotic Surgery to 34 hospitals in a dozen Indian cities, in just five years, while the number of trained robotic surgeons has grown to 190.
Vattikuti Foundation began promoting Robotic Surgery in the US in 1997 and has since played a stellar role in spreading it across the US, Europe and India.
Under the Vattikuti Foundation program, surgeons working at the Vattikuti Urology Center at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit developed procedures for Prostate Cancer surgery which has become the Gold standard--Robotic Prostatectomy-- in the US.
Since then the Foundation has been working with surgeons around the world to pioneer various Robotic procedures including one for kidney transplant, developed co-operatively by Indian surgeons from Hospitals in Delhi and Ahmedabad.
Indian surgeons have been adapting to this new–age tool with great enthusiasm and skill. At the recent Robotic Surgeons’ conference hosted by the Foundation, over 120 Robotic Surgeons participated and shared their experience and techniques.