By Noimot Olaiwola/Staff Reporter The Hamad Medical Corporation’s surgery department has become the first facility in the region to introduce AirSeal - an intelligent and integrated access system- for surgical smoke evacuation during laparoscopic and robotic surgery.“Surgical smoke is part of the patient care environment wherever surgical or invasive procedures are performed and it results from interaction of tissue and mechanical tools or heat-producing equipment, such as those that are used for dissection and hemostasis,” SurgiQuest executive vice director Carlos Babini explained at a press conference yesterday.SurgiQuest is the inventor of the AirSeal, which costs up to $25,000 in the US.The most common heat-producing device is the electrosurgical unit, which uses radio-frequency current to cut and coagulate tissue, he said.“Surgical smoke is made up of 95% water or steam and five percent debris in the form of particulate material, which composed of chemicals, blood and tissue particles as well as viruses and bacteria,” he mentioned adding that two of the chemical composition of surgical smoke that calls for concern are acrylonitrile and hydrogen cyanide.
He stressed that as lasers and electro-surgery have become commonplace, peri-operative practitioners are at increased risk for health concerns associated with exposure to surgical smoke.“Since the mid 70s, the body of evidence documenting the hazardous components of surgical smoke has continued to grow and since the last 30 years, there have been little innovation in the development of devices necessary for safely pumping out extra gas such as carbon dioxide (CO2) from the abdomen of the patients being operated on,” Babini said.According to him, CO2 is being used in laparoscopic insufflation because the human body can eliminate the gas very quickly.However, he maintained that the negative side of using carbon dioxide is that it could lead to hypocardial, shoulder or body pain, if the body absorbs too much.“By providing stable pneumo-peritoneum, continuous smoke evacuation and valve-free access to the abdominal cavity, the AirSeal System reduces procedural time, costs, and hassles in ways that conventional insufflation, trocar and filtered tubing systems simply cannot do,” he stated.He mentioned that the system can also provide some protection for the operating room staff from inhaling carcinogens, organisms and pathogens that are pumped into the air during the conventional insufflation.“AirSeal removes the particles within the surgical smoke being released into the operating room and the staff are safeguarded against such chemicals that could cause them to have cancer, leukemia or kidney damage later on,” he stressed.Speaking about his experience using the device, HMC Surgery Department chairman Dr Abdallah al-Ansari said he now conduct laparoscopic or robotic surgery with more ease.“Using the AirSeal system has removed the stress usually experienced during operation because with the conventional insufflator, surgery assistant has to suck smoke every now and then and they also need to clean the laparoscope (laparoscopy camera) due to vapour from the smoke, which always cause the vision of the inside view of the patient to be blurred to the surgeon. And this always tamper with the time and process of the procedure,” he explained.Some of the advantages of AirSeal against the conventional insufflation according to him, are: there is no need to clean camera; there is no smell in the operating room; the quality of air in the operating room does not change; and it has a good suction system that prevent the air from escaping into the operating room.According to him, the department is hoping to acquire up to six units of AirSeal System for use in all its laparoscopic and robotic surgeries.According to Dr al-Ansari, between 20-30 surgical procedures are being performed daily at the Surgery department, which has four operating rooms.