Stellenbosch University (SU) has announced that South Africa’s first ever robotic surgery for the removal of a donor kidney has been successfully conducted at Tygerberg Hospital in Cape Town. The kidney was removed from a 54-year-old mother and transplanted into her 24-year-old daughter. The transplanted organ is now functioning properly within the recipient’s body, while the donor was discharged the day after the surgery.

The surgery was executed by a joint staff member of SU (Division of Urology) and the Western Cape Department of Health and Wellness (Tygerberg Hospital), urologist Dr Danelo du Plessis. This type of surgery is called a donor nephrectomy, and it is carried out using a da Vinci Xi robotic platform, which allows surgery with outstanding precision via four robotic arms, which were controlled through an immersive 3D console. “The surgery exceeded our expectations, [and was] completed in under 30 minutes,” he reported.

While robotic surgery has already been used in South Africa to remove diseased or damaged kidneys, the removal of a healthy kidney for donation is a far more complicated procedure. It requires not merely the removal of the complete kidney itself, but also the preservation of the full length of that kidney’s blood vessels, ureter and organ integrity, to ensure the success of the transplant.

“When operating on perfectly healthy donors, it is essential to have a refined technique,” he explained. “Living donors make this extraordinary sacrifice purely from altruism – they deserve a safe and minimally invasive procedure. This technology delivers on that promise.”

“This milestone demonstrates our commitment to innovation and excellence in patient care,” highlighted Tygerberg Hospital CEO Dr Matodzi Mukosi. “The successful robotic kidney donor surgery is a first for South Africa and a proud moment for Tygerberg Hospital. It reflects the extraordinary skill of our surgical teams and highlights the life-changing impact of medical innovation for our patients and their families.”

Since 2022, SU and Tygerberg Hospital have been running a comprehensive training programme for robotic surgery, aimed at both upskilling qualified surgeons and instructing senior trainees in advanced surgical procedures.

“Robotic surgery is a new technology that has been used safely in many parts of the world for procedures like nephrectomies and [prostate-removing] prostatectomies,” pointed out SU Medicine and Health Sciences Faculty Dean (and transplant surgeon) Professor Elmi Muller. “In a large consensus meeting around the use of robotic surgery in the field of transplantation at the end of 2024, we found that robotic surgery now provides similar results to standard laparoscopic procedures.” (Laparoscopy involves inserting a thin lighted tube, attached to a video camera, into a patient’s abdomen, through a tiny incision in the abdomen.)