Interview with Dr. Hudson on the LigaSure™ Device
Today, we're here with Dr. Hudson to discuss an exciting new addition to our surgical suite, the LigaSure™ device. Dr. Hudson, thanks for joining us.
Thank you for having me. I'm thrilled to talk about the LigaSure™ device and how it benefits our patients and help you understand why we're adding this device to our practice.
Dr. Glen Hudson
Highland Park Animal Hospital
What exactly is a LigaSure™ device?
So essentially the LigaSure™ device is a piece of electrocautery unit. It has multiple uses. On a smaller part, there is the attachments to be able to use electricity as a cutting blade instead of a physical scalpel. The benefit from that is as the heat from that is used to make the incision, it significantly decreases any bleeding that may occur. The other attachment, the LigaSure™ attachment to the device, is a tool that is used with similar technology through electricity and heat to actually fuse the vessels shut. So when we are performing common surgeries, we often encounter different vessels and stuff that we have to tie off before cutting to prevent bleeding. That is a very tedious process, especially in some of our surgeries that require lots of vessels. And as a result, this will seal the vessels and cut them in seconds.
Which procedures normally use the LigaSure™ device?
On the first part, on the first handheld part, you can use that essentially in any surgery out there almost, ranging from our common mass removals, our TPLO surgeries, anything that we need to make an incision into the skin and perform a surgery. On the ligasure part, we commonly use it on intra-abdominal procedures, anything that we are encountering vessels. So some of our big things that come to mind are splenectomies, which are removing the spleen, as well as spay procedures and a few other ones.
How does a LigaSure™ device improve safety and benefit our patients?
So there's really a twofold reason that this improves, that the patient improves greatly from the use of this. The first one is it significantly decreases anesthetic time. An average splenectomy can easily take an hour, sometimes even longer. A spay, less than that, but still a little bit more lengthy under traditional methods. Utilizing this, you can make the procedure about 25% or so of what the normal time is. So it is reasonable for the surgery to only take 15 minutes, assuming no complications, when it really would have been 45 minutes to an hour. That obviously increases patient time under anesthesia, has been shown to have many positive correlations on outcome, preventing infection, eat quicker, recovery, less pain associated. The second benefit is it kind of eliminates the ability for human error. When we're tying off manually vessels with sutures under normal technique, that can leave some room for error, for bleeding and whatnot. This tool very, very reliably seals vessels and cuts them all in a matter of seconds.
The LigaSure™ device is a significant addition to our surgical toolkit!
We're always looking for ways to improve patient care and surgical outcomes. The LigaSure™ device is a valuable asset in achieving that goal.
If you have any other questions, please give us a call at (214) 833-9821. You can also email us at info@hpanimalhospital.com and we will get back to you as soon as we are able. Don't forget to follow us on social media: Facebook and Instagram