'It took years to get pain-relieving surgery - I hope a robot means others won't have to wait'

Like thousands of women in Northern Ireland, Colleen Crothers waited decades for medical help to treat chronic endometriosis - and, now thanks to an all-island first, she's hoping her long road will be a thing of the past.

"Robotic surgery came too late for me," she said. "I hope other women won't have to wait as long."

She is talking about a new breakthrough for female patients in Northern Ireland - the Da Vinci gynae robot at Belfast City Hospital.

Operated by humans, the robot's wrists can twist and turn in tight pelvic spaces and it is said to be more precise at complex surgery than a human hand because it is steadier.

Belfast's Da Vinci robot is the first of its kind on the island of Ireland and one of only a few across the UK.

It has the potential to massively reduce complex gynaecological surgical waiting lists in Northern Ireland, which affect thousands of women's physical and mental health and their ability to have children.

With an average wait of about seven years for complex surgery, which involves several specialities, delayed treatment means some women require a hysterectomy, like Colleen at 41.

She has lived with chronic endometriosis all of her adult life, having first begun to experience chronic period pain aged 14.

But it took another 22 years before she was referred to gynaecology and a scan confirmed she had both adenomyosis and endometriosis.

"I missed out so much of family life due to daily pain - pain that went on for years," she said.

"I can't have children - I have had to have a hysterectomy and I'm in early menopause.

"To be told you can't have children is hard to swallow," she said.

An urgent case, Colleen missed out on a Da Vinci operation by just weeks earlier this year.

Da Vinci became part of the Belfast City Hospital's gynaecology team in May.

It cost £2.4m and was funded through charitable donations for gynaecological services within the trust.

To date it has performed 130 surgeries - 105 of them being on women with complex endometriosis - and four consultants have been trained to use the robot.

It means that complex gynaecology cases are being treated as a priority and are not being bumped when other surgical cases, including cancer cases, come in.

BBC News NI was given access to see the Da Vinci in action - and, like a real-life sci-fi creation, it has multiple towering robotic arms that hover over the patient.

While humans are also in the theatre, it gives the surgeon a digital boost with incisions more precise and less invasive.

Dr Hans Nagar, a consultant gynaecological surgeon and oncologist, is one of the surgeons trained to operate Da Vinci. He said women with complex endometriosis had previously been ill-served in Northern Ireland.

"They require complex surgery involving different specialists and now Da Vinci lets us do that," he said.