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RobotRisk / Intuitive Surgical / 2021-09

Lawsuit: da Vinci surgical robot burned woman's small intestine

S4 · 09/2021 · Intuitive Surgical · FL, USA

Record

CompanyIntuitive Surgical
Categorymedical robotics
Typemalfunction
Date09/2021
Time of daynot documented
LocationFL, USA
SeverityS4 (serious injury, total loss, or grounding)
Scale-
Confidencemedium
VerificationYes - adversarially checked against the cited source
SourceNBC News

What happened

Lawsuit alleges a da Vinci surgical robot burned a Florida woman's small intestine during surgery.

Intuitive Surgical record context

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Comparable malfunction events in medical robotics

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S12026-03Keenon RoboticsRestaurant service robot malfunctions, scatters tableware
S32025Intuitive Surgical2015-2025 MAUDE study finds continued adverse event rate in da Vinci procedures
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S2Medtronic HugoField safety notice for Hugo surgeon console power supply failure
S4Intuitive SurgicalNBC News 10-year MAUDE analysis of da Vinci adverse events

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