Robot revolution: 'Patients have voted for it'

Two decades ago, Professor Tony Costello witnessed what he believed was the start of a surgical revolution.

His trip to the United States in 2002 led to a transformation of healthcare in Australia, which would become a destination for specialists around the world seeking to join his futuristic movement.

"I had seen a prototype of robotics in the US, developed by a start-up company at Stanford University," recalled Prof Costello, a urologist at Victoria's Epworth HealthCare.

"'The US Department of Defence and NASA collaborated to build a robot that would digitise a surgeon's handmovements inside a body, through small ports. I was just blown away by the technology."

On returning home, he persuaded Epworth's Group Chief Executive at the time, Denis Hogg, to invest in a da Vinci surgical robot the following year – the first of its kind in the Asia-Pacific region.

"He was a very forward-thinking CEO and a marvellous contributor to development in medicine at Epworth," Prof Costello said.

"Denis, in his great wisdom, spent $3 million and purchased one of the robots."

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