Research presented by Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) at this month’s North American Spine Society (NASS) Annual Meeting showed that patients who underwent robotic-assisted minimally invasive lumbar fusion surgery required “significantly less opioid medication during their hospital stay, without increased complications or longer hospital stays, compared with patients treated using conventional navigation-guided techniques.”
The HSS study, which evaluated 804 patients who underwent one- or two-level lumbar fusion procedures between 2017 and 2025, found that the 601 patients whose surgeries employed robotic-assisted guidance for additional stability and precision used less opioid medication during their hospitalization and were “significantly less likely to require intravenous patient-controlled analgesia (PCA), a stronger form of pain management.”
Specifically, the findings for patients where robotic assistance was employed included:
“Reducing patients’ exposure to opioid medications after surgery remains an important goal in spine care,” stated study co-author Sheeraz A. Qureshi, MD, MBA, co-chief of HSS Spine. “While robotic technology is often recognized for improving surgical precision, these results suggest its benefits may extend beyond the operating room.”
The study is significant, HSS notes, because previous studies surrounding robotic assistance in the specialty have “largely focused on implant placement accuracy and surgical efficiency,” but not on “whether robotic assistance influences postoperative pain management.”
Added study co-author and HSS spine surgeon Kyle W. Morse, MD, “These findings suggest robotic guidance may offer meaningful benefits for patients recovering from lumbar fusion surgery and could play an important role in future opioid-sparing perioperative care pathways.”
