Incorporating the concept of transnatural cavity surgery

  Abdominal wall scarless surgery is a hot area of minimally invasive surgery development in recent years, and its significant advantage lies in the perfect combination of physiological minimally invasive and psychological minimally invasive, and the related research and literature reports at home and abroad have shown a spurt of growth. Transumbilical single-port laparoscopic surgery is a more mature form of scarless abdominal wall surgery in clinical practice, and we have performed more than 30 types of single-port laparoscopic surgery in more than 1000 cases. Since there is no significant scar on the abdominal wall after surgery, it is very popular among patients. Transcatheter surgery, another form of scarless abdominal wall surgery, is still being explored internationally, and only sporadic studies have been reported in clinical practice due to bottlenecks in the development of surgical instrument platforms.  On November 2, we collaborated with Director Wang Danbo to perform the first transvaginal posterior fornix laparoscopic appendectomy for an ovarian teratoma in China. The patient, a 27-year-old young woman with strong cosmetic requirements, came to our hospital expecting to be able to remove a 7-cm-sized teratoma on her ovary and a recurrent inflammatory appendix without leaving any scar on her abdominal wall. During the operation, Director Wang Danbo skillfully removed the ovarian teratoma through the posterior vaginal fornix in less than an hour. We then placed three Trcar into the posterior fornix incision and removed the diseased appendix under the pneumoperitoneum using traditional rigid laparoscopy and surgical instruments, overcoming and solving technical problems such as poor pneumoperitoneum and appendiceal stump treatment, and accumulating valuable experience. The whole operation took less than two hours, which not only removed the patient’s pain and achieved satisfactory clinical results, but also realized the patient’s wish and dream.  The innovative operation of this case integrated the concept of transnatural laparoscopy and used traditional rigid laparoscopy instead of soft endoscopy, avoiding the bottleneck of endoscopic surgery hardware, making transnatural laparoscopy easier to carry out and popularize in clinical practice, which will enable more patients to realize the minimally invasive dream of relieving pain without scarring on the abdominal wall; the successful completion of this operation also highlighted the strong strength of our hospital’s minimally invasive surgery technology and multidisciplinary collaboration.