A kidney tumour has been removed by a robot surgeon while the patient was awake in a world first in Turin, the Molinette Hospital said Wednesday. The groundbreaking operation was performed in the Molinette's urology university department.

It used the Da Vinci robot system and innovative 3-D image reconstruction technologies, doctors said. The malign tumour was removed and the kidney saved, they said. Italian hospitals have been at the cutting edge of robotic surgery in recent years.