A Windsor teen is standing tall after being the first paediatric patient in Ontario to undergo spinal surgery using the Medtronic Mazor robotic spine platform.
London Health Sciences Centre first acquired the device in 2025, but when Paige Hillman,14, underwent surgery in March, she was the first paediatric patient to undergo the procedure.
The procedure, a scoliosis correction, helps to straighten the spine using rods and screws. The Mazor helps with precision and speed, which improves outcomes and recovery time.
Paige's mom, Melissa Hillman, also suffers from scoliosis and knows first-hand the pain that comes with the condition. With the help of the team of doctors at Children’s Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre she decided this was the best course of action.
"I was a little scared at first. I did a lot of Googling to make sure I knew exactly what we were getting ourselves into, with the doctor's help explaining everything to us, and we decided this is probably the best procedure for her," said Melissa Hillman.
Paige also admitted to being nervous but liked the idea of being the first in the province.
"It felt cool cool cause I told my friends about it, and they kept saying that I'm going to be famous and all that, but I'm not going to be that famous. I thought that was fun, but I was also a little bit scared because I've never had a surgery before," said Paige Hillman.
Paediatric Orthopaedic Surgeon Dr. Patrick Thornley said Paige was a good candidate for the procedure.
"She had appropriate anatomy that would allow us to instrument the spine and get a great correction if we could have the robot place a couple of the more challenging screws on the concave side, which is the side that is the most rotated," said Dr. Thornley.
The surgery was a huge success.
"We likely saved 15-20 minutes of operative time which has significant cost and patient benefit outcomes for her and we were able to get them all in a perfect position using the pre-planned software so then our correction was near radiographically perfect which is what we were hoping for," said Dr. Thornley.
Dr. Thornley said after just six weeks of recovery time you couldn't even tell Paige had the procedure.
"Her post-operative course was completely unremarkable, and we mean that in the best way possible. She was sitting at the side of the bed by the first evening and up and walking the next day and home on a rapid post-operative recovery pathway," said Dr. Thornley.
"I'm hoping this means she's not going to be in a lot of pain when she gets older. Hopefully, she'll be able to do everything normally and not like I have a hard time doing a lot of things, so I'm hoping she won't have those issues when she gets older," said Melissa Hillman.
Both the University Hospital as well as the Victoria Hospital and Children’s Hospital sites now operate their own Mazor robotic platforms, and to date, surgeons across LHSC have performed 10 to 15 procedures using the platform, across a range of patient ages and conditions.
"I think we've had great success with Paige as the first case, and now that we're past the acute period post-op, we've seen that she's done excellently with this, and I think there's going to be growing and increasing comfort in using this on ensuing patients," said Dr. Thornley.
