Most women who end up needing gynecologic surgery meet their surgeon late. The gynecologist who has followed the fibroids for three years refers you out, you have one pre-operative appointment with someone new, and the person who knows the whole history is not in the room.
Dr. Gomez performs minimally invasive robotic gynecologic surgery herself, at BayCare Hospital Wesley Chapel. If an operation turns out to be the right step, the provider who worked through the diagnosis with you is the same one who performs it and the same one who follows you afterwards.
What she performs
- Hysterectomy — removal of the uterus, where symptoms or disease warrant it.
- Myomectomy — removal of fibroids while leaving the uterus in place, which matters if you may want to carry a pregnancy.
- Excision of endometriosis — removing the disease rather than only treating the pain it causes.
- Pelvic laparoscopy — for diagnosis and treatment of pelvic pain, cysts and adhesions through small incisions.
- Dilation and curettage (D&C) — most often for abnormal bleeding or to obtain tissue for diagnosis.
- Tubal ligation — permanent contraception.
- Hysteroscopy — looking directly inside the uterus. Done in the office as well as in the operating room, depending on severity.
Not all of these require a hospital. Where something can be handled in the office it generally is — you avoid the anesthesia and the recovery that come with an operating room. The more involved the problem, the more likely it moves to the OR.
Where surgery happens
Your consultations, work-up and follow-up stay at the Altavida office in Lutz. The operating facility is BayCare Hospital Wesley Chapel, at 4501 Bruce B. Downs Blvd.
We name the hospital up front because you need it. Surgery produces more than one bill — the surgeon's professional fee and the hospital's facility charge are separate, and your plan can treat them differently. Being in network with Dr. Gomez does not by itself mean the facility is in network. Before you schedule, call your insurer and ask about both, and about anesthesia, which a third group bills. It is a tedious call and it is how people avoid a surprise bill.
Tell us what you find and we will work with it. If cost is the thing standing in the way, say so early rather than late — there is usually more room to plan than people expect.
What robotic surgery actually is
The name does more harm than good. Nothing operates autonomously — the surgeon sits at a console a few feet from the table and controls every instrument directly, in real time. What the system contributes is a magnified three-dimensional view of the pelvis and instruments that bend and rotate more precisely than a human wrist can inside a confined space.
The practical consequence is the size of the incisions. Rather than one long opening, the procedure is done through a few small ones. For many gynecologic operations that means less blood loss, less time in hospital, and a quicker return to ordinary life than open surgery.
When it is considered
Surgery is rarely the first answer, and on this site it is deliberately not presented as one. Fibroids, endometriosis and abnormal uterine bleeding all have medical and in-office options that come first, and many women never need an operation at all.
Where surgery does become the right step — because symptoms have not responded, because the anatomy demands it, or because a diagnosis needs to be made definitively — the question becomes which approach, not whether technology is involved.
An honest note on the evidence
Robotic assistance is frequently marketed as straightforwardly superior. The evidence is more qualified than that.
Minimally invasive approaches generally do show advantages over open surgery in recovery time and blood loss for many gynecologic procedures. But robotic versus conventional laparoscopy is a genuinely mixed picture in the literature, and for some patients and some anatomy an open approach remains the safer choice. A surgeon who tells you the robot is always better is selling something. The right approach depends on your case.
Before anything operative
The first visit is a diagnostic conversation. Expect imaging to be reviewed, non-surgical options to be discussed properly, and a clear explanation of what each path involves — including doing nothing for now, which is sometimes the correct answer.
This page is general education about a surgical approach and is not a substitute for individual medical advice. Whether surgery is appropriate for you, and which approach is safest, can only be determined in consultation.
