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HIGHLAND — A robot probably isn't the first thing that comes to mind when you think of hospital equipment, and especially not in a school.
The da Vinci XI robotic-assisted surgical system, which usually calls American Fork Hospital home, paid the halls at Lone Peak High School a visit Monday to give students an up-close look and hands-on experience with robot-assisted surgery.
"The thing that's great about this is that it is a very precise type of surgery and it does away with the need for many hands right at the surgical site. The incisions are small instead of bigger, and it allows for the surgeon to kind of see exactly his surgical field through the cameras that are operated off those arms," said Tami Montgomery, surgical services manager at American Fork Hospital.
"What all of that means for you as the patient is that you're going to have less pain, you're going to have a shorter recovery time ... and there's less of a likelihood for you to get a surgical site infection," she said.
Medical science and robotics students lingered around the machine, watched it in action and even got the chance to try their hand at conducting surgery with the machine — though they only operated on Snickers candy bars.
"When you get a hands-on experience, it really helps you go, as a student, 'Either I like this and want more of it, or I don't like it and I know now that I can cross it off the list," said Matt Paskett, a teacher at Lone Peak High School and medical class content specialist for Alpine School District. "That's the goal — get kids some exposure to a new skill and maybe a career opportunity."
One of the big reasons for the collaboration between Intermountain Healthcare and the Alpine School District, Paskett and Montgomery said, was to show students that there are career opportunities in the medical field beyond being a nurse, doctor or surgeon.
"That's, I think, what we want kids to see," Paskett said. "It's what levels or nursing, what levels of being a doctor or a surgeon are there and how can we give kids the best opportunity to find that out at an early age so they can enjoy a long career at something they feel passionate about?"
Additionally, Montgomery said she's hopeful hands-on events can be used as a recruitment tool to get more students interested in the medical field, especially after many left the field during the pandemic.
"We are so in the market for any student that's interested in nursing school or even as an operating room tech. Anything that will bring them to our door to want jobs there, anything we can do to excite them about that is worth it, because we need the help," Montgomery said.
Spencer Gygi, a Lone Peak High School senior who serves as the president of the school's health club, said seeing and operating the robotic surgical system was "super inspiring."
"Hands-on learning helps you remember more and you feel more involved rather than just keeping up in your brain, you can actually physically use the skills that you learned and practice," Gygi said.
Monday's school visit for Intermountain's da Vinci XI robotic-assisted surgical system was a first for the robot, and although the system is in "high demand," Paskett said he hopes to bring it to more schools in the future.
