KATV Channel 7 - The Spirit of Arkansas: Surgery Via Belly Button: Mercy Docs get trained on minimally invasive surgeries

Surgery Via Belly Button: Mercy Docs get trained on minimally invasive surgeries

Contact Jeffrey Slatton at 501-517-0365 or

jeffrey.slatton@mercy.net for information

Surgery Via Belly Button

Mercy Docs get trained on minimally invasive surgeries

What:    Mobile tractor-trailer, outfitted with high-tech gadgets, will provide surgeons on-site belly button surgery training. Media can also try the tools out and work with the instruments.

When:   10:30 a.m., Tuesday, March 15

Where: St. Joseph's Mercy Health Center parking lot (300 Werner St., Hot Springs)

Whether you need to have your gall bladder, kidney or appendix removed, your surgeon can make a single incision in your belly button.

And instead of flying hundreds of miles away, Mercy surgeons can step outside their office and into a high-tech, tractor-trailer for a day of training. The Covidien Innovation Tour provides valuable training for surgeons performing "belly button" procedures, while keeping them close to home and their patients.

The 85-foot, nearly 80,000-pound trailer expands to 1,200-square-feet when parked. It contains a clinical training area with advanced audio-visual tools and six operating room stations accommodating 12 surgeons simultaneously. There, the surgeons practice single-incision laparoscopic surgery (SILS) through the belly button, reducing four, ½-inch or smaller incisions normally associated with traditional laparoscopic surgery to just one. The procedure can be used in gynecologic, bariatric and urologic surgeries.

A small sponge holds the single incision open and a light, camera and laparoscopic tools are inserted. While the main benefit to the patient is cosmetic, there is also less operative pain than traditional laparoscopic surgeries.

St. Joseph's Mercy physicians Dr. Jaime Cardenas and Dr. Chuck Wright will be available to talk about the training and demonstrate the procedure.

St. Joseph's Mercy is a not-for-profit, faith-based health facility with 27 medical clinics serving the healthcare needs of Hot Springs and its surrounding communities since 1888. We are the region's most preferred provider of health care services including cardiac, cancer and women's services and the sixth largest hospital in Arkansas. Learn more about St. Joseph's Mercy at www.saintjosephs.com.

Jeffrey Slatton

Media Relations Specialist

St. Joseph's Mercy Health System

Office: 501-622-1570

Mobile: 501-517-0365

www.saintjosephs.com