[Robot-assisted Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting].

The application for robot-assisted coronary surgery ranges from internal thoracic artery (ITA) harvesting with hand-sewn anastomoses to totally endoscopic coronary artery bypass grafting (TECAB), either on- or off-pump. The bilateral IMA can be harvested with the aid of a surgical robot and then multivessel bypass grafting can follow. Such robot-assisted minimally invasive direct coronary artery bypass grafting is called "ThoraCAB". Surgical robots cannot only endoscopically harvest the ITA but they can also anastomose the coronary artery in TECAB. But TECAB still has the difficulties, such as narrow surgical field in Japanese patients. Both procedures have the significant advantages of minimizing surgical trauma, such as reduced comlications, faster return back to normal activities and being improved cosmesis, and which have resulted in the development of minimally invasive surgery. Robot-assisted cardiac surgery for structural heart disease has been approved by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) since December 2015, however, robot-assisted cardiac surgery for TECAB has not been approved yet in Japan.