Surgeons are always on the lookout for innovative new devices that could help the more than 2.9 million people that have laparoscopic surgery in the U.S. each year. Laparoscopic surgery is a less invasive way to perform procedures that used to require open surgery. Instead of making a large incision, it uses a set of much smaller cuts that provide access points for different specialized surgical instruments that can then be manipulated using customized grips, to perform procedures such as gall bladder and appendix removals.

Enter Teleflex, a medical device innovator based in Wayne, PA, that has come up with a new device, the Percuvance percutaneous surgical system that will allow the same procedures to be performed with less incisions and smaller openings. Until now, the surgical tools used in these procedures were inserted through a series of up to five trocars, which require incisions of between 5 and 10 millimeters each. This series of incisions causes the most trauma to the patient and take time to recover from.

“The holy grail for laparoscopic surgery has been an incision smaller than 3 millimeters” said John Tushar, president and general manager of the Teleflex surgical division. Teleflex’s new system has a shaft with a tip less than 3 millimeters in diameter. The tip is easily interchangeable, allowing different tools to be fitted outside of the body, for the different stages of the procedure. As a result of the fewer number and smaller size of the incisions, the openings can be closed by using only an adhesive bandage or surgical adhesive glue.

Other ways to reduce the number of incisions have been tried before, such as single incision surgery which uses a single opening up to 20 millimeters long. But most of them have limitations as surgeons require different angles to manipulate their tools and run out of space to work in. “In laparoscopic surgery, it’s all about creating vector and angles for retraction and countertraction.” Tushar said.

Teleflex’s Percuvance system, which has already received approval from the Food and Drug Administration, was successfully used for the first time last month at a Clinic in Cleveland. It is also going to be tested at nine other hospitals in the U.S. as well as up to eight medical centers in Europe.  If everything goes as expected, the product will be launched worldwide in 2016.

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