Surgical Procedures and Innovations

Columbia surgeons perform scarless operations for a variety of procedures that previously required abdominal incisions and considerable recovery time.

• Retro-uterine surgery: In female patients, gallbladder removal, or cholecystectomy, is performed through a small internal incision behind the uterus. This procedure is known as a retro-uterine cholecystectomy. Appendectomy can be performed using the same technique.
• Single port surgery, in which articulating instruments are inserted through a single incision in the navel, is utilized for cholecystectomy, appendectomy, and gastric sleeve obesity surgery.
• Endoscopic procedures performed through the mouth with a special multi-channeled instrument are used to perform restorative obesity surgery to tighten an enlarged stomach pouch after gastric bypass. This procedure is known as endoscopic revision of obesity surgery, or EROS. The same endoscopic technology is used to treat gastro-esophageal reflux disease (GERD).

In the past, gallbladder surgery required major abdominal surgery that left patients with a long scar.


Laparoscopic gallbladder surgery creates small scars.


Now, natural orifice translumenal endoscopic surgery (NOTES) eliminates even those small incisions.