Laurel Duggan on July 10, 2023
Surgeons at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) are using a medical robot to assist with vaginoplasties, or the surgical construction of a vulva and vagina, according to various posts on the organization’s website.
OHSU’s gender program, urological program and reconstructive urology referral center all boast of a high volume of clients on their respective web pages, and Dr. Blair Peters, a surgeon leading the gender program, boasted that the gender surgery clinic had “the highest volume on the West Coast” and could operate two robot-assisted vaginoplasties daily, according to a recent report from the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal. In addition to vaginoplasty, OHSU offers phalloplasty (the surgical construction of a penis), non-binary genital “nullification” surgeries and mastectomies.
The vaginoplasty robot, which City Journal called a “castration machine,” allows surgeons to use internal tissue to construct a vagina, replacing or supplementing the more common technique of using existing male genital tissue.
“Robotic surgery is a sophisticated way of doing surgery on the inside of the belly cavity without making a big incision. And that approach allows you to use tissue from the inside of the belly cavity to be part of the vagina,” an OHSU employee explained in a 2021 video on OHSU’s YouTube channel.
“In addition to the traditional penile inversion vaginoplasty, we also offer a robotic approach. In the robotic approach, we create your external genitals in the same way, but I also make an incision above your belly button and one on your hip,” OHSU surgeon Dr. Geolani Dy said in the same video. “And through these incisions, I am able to bring in the robotic instruments. Using the robotic instruments, I dissect a space between your bladder and your rectum for your vagina. The robotic approach also allows me to take tissue from the inner lining of your belly called peritoneum. Using the peritoneum, I make the deepest portion of your vagina. The robotic approach may be especially useful for people with limited genital skin.”
OHSU surgeon Dr. Blair Peters has discussed vaginoplasties and the use of the surgical robot, including on young patients, in several public interviews. Peters admitted that genital surgeries are performed on adolescents and suggested that medical professionals are still figuring out “what works” in a video published by Manhattan Institute senior fellow Christopher Rufo.
