Operate with maximum precision, minimum aggression, preserving life quality.
El envejecimiento trae consigo una epidemia silenciosa: la hiperplasia benigna de próstata afecta a la gran mayoría de los hombres al llegar a los ochenta años, y durante décadas el tratamiento quirúrgico ha exigido un sacrificio que muchos no estaban dispuestos a aceptar. Ahora, en Barcelona, una tecnología llamada Aquabeam® reescribe ese pacto: un brazo robótico guiado por ultrasonido elimina el tejido prostático con solución salina a presión, sin calor, sin el daño colateral que durante años alejó a los pacientes de la sala de operaciones. Es un recordatorio de que el verdadero progreso médico no consiste solo en curar la enfermedad, sino en devolver al paciente entero.
- Millones de hombres han soportado años de síntomas urinarios graves porque la cirugía tradicional amenazaba con privarles de la función eyaculatoria y la continencia, convirtiendo el remedio en una pérdida irreparable.
- El láser, herramienta dominante durante dos décadas, genera calor que daña estructuras nerviosas y musculares delicadas, dejando a más del 80% de los pacientes con eyaculación retrógrada permanente.
- Aquabeam® invierte esa estadística: aproximadamente el 90% de los hombres conserva la función eyaculatoria normal tras la intervención, gracias a la guía robótica en tiempo real que ninguna mano humana puede igualar en precisión.
- Barcelona cuenta ya con el único sistema Aquabeam® operativo de la ciudad, en el Instituto de Tecnología Médica del doctor Gilberto Chechile, quien lo describe como un compromiso con la dignidad del paciente, no solo con la eficacia clínica.
- La tecnología apunta a convertirse en el estándar para próstatas de gran tamaño, abriendo la puerta a pacientes que postergaron el tratamiento por miedo, y transformando una elección imposible en una opción real.
La hiperplasia benigna de próstata es una de las consecuencias más silenciosas del envejecimiento masculino: a los ochenta años, ocho de cada diez hombres la padecen, con síntomas que erosionan la vida cotidiana de formas que pocas personas ajenas comprenden. Durante décadas, la cirugía ofrecía alivio urinario a un precio alto: pérdida de la función eyaculatoria en la mayoría de los casos, y en algunos, incontinencia. Ese miedo ha mantenido a muchos pacientes en un limbo de síntomas crecientes, convencidos de que la cura era peor que la enfermedad.
El doctor Gilberto Chechile, director del Instituto de Tecnología Médica y del Instituto de Próstata en Barcelona, lleva años observando cómo esa ecuación comenzaba a cambiar. La llegada de Aquabeam® ha acelerado esa transformación. A diferencia de los láseres que vaporizan tejido mediante calor, este sistema emplea un brazo robótico guiado en tiempo real por ultrasonido que elimina el tejido prostático con solución salina a presión, sin generar daño térmico alguno. La diferencia técnica es profunda en sus consecuencias humanas.
Donde la cirugía láser provoca eyaculación retrógrada en más del 80% de los pacientes, Aquabeam® invierte esa cifra: cerca del 90% de los hombres conserva la función eyaculatoria normal. Para hombres sexualmente activos en sus sesenta y setenta años, esto no es un detalle menor. La incontinencia grave, otro temor frecuente, se vuelve excepcional gracias a la precisión robótica que permite preservar las estructuras responsables de la continencia con una exactitud que supera las posibilidades de la cirugía manual.
Chechile subraya que no se trata solo de operar mejor, sino de operar con una filosofía distinta: el objetivo ya no es únicamente restaurar el flujo urinario, sino hacerlo preservando la continencia, la función sexual y la calidad de vida que da sentido a esos años. Barcelona alberga hoy el único sistema Aquabeam® operativo de la ciudad. Lo que durante años fue una elección imposible —soportar los síntomas o asumir las secuelas— empieza a tener una tercera vía: tratar la enfermedad y preservar al hombre.
Benign prostate enlargement is a quiet epidemic of aging. By the time a man reaches eighty, there is an eighty percent chance his prostate has swollen enough to compress the urethra running through it, making urination difficult, frequent, urgent—the kind of problem that erodes daily life in ways younger people rarely understand. For decades, urologists have faced a difficult bargain: the surgery works, but the cost is often steep. Men emerge continent and able to urinate, but many lose the ability to ejaculate normally, and some struggle with incontinence. The fear of these side effects has kept countless patients from seeking treatment, even as their symptoms worsen.
Dr. Gilberto Chechile, who directs the Medical Technology Institute and the Prostate Institute in Barcelona, has watched this calculus shift with the arrival of a new tool called Aquabeam®. The technology represents a fundamental departure from the laser techniques that have dominated prostate surgery for the past two decades. Where lasers use heat to vaporize or cut tissue—a blunt instrument, however refined—Aquabeam® employs a robotic arm guided in real time by ultrasound, using pressurized saline solution to remove prostate tissue without generating any thermal damage at all. The difference sounds technical, but its implications are deeply human.
The precision matters most where it counts. Traditional laser surgery leaves retrograde ejaculation—where semen travels backward into the bladder instead of forward—in more than eighty percent of treated patients. With Aquabeam®, that figure inverts: roughly ninety percent of men retain normal ejaculatory function after surgery. For sexually active men in their sixties and seventies, this is not a minor distinction. It is the difference between accepting a permanent loss and preserving an essential part of their lives. Severe urinary incontinence, another feared complication, becomes rare with Aquabeam® because the robotic guidance and real-time ultrasound imaging allow surgeons to spare the delicate structures responsible for continence with a precision that human hands alone cannot match.
Chechile emphasizes that this is not simply about doing the same operation better. Modern prostate surgery, he argues, has entered a new philosophical territory. The goal is no longer merely to fix the plumbing—to restore urinary flow. It is to restore urinary flow while preserving continence, sexual function, and the overall quality of life that makes those years worth living. Aquabeam® embodies that philosophy. It works especially well in men with large prostates, where traditional techniques become technically demanding and complications more likely. It offers a path for patients who have delayed surgery out of fear, who have endured years of symptoms because the cure seemed worse than the disease.
Barcelona now has the only operational Aquabeam® system in the city, housed at Chechile's institute. He sees it as a clear commitment to minimally invasive urology and to the idea that innovation should serve not just medical efficacy but human dignity. The technology will likely become standard for large prostate cases, he suggests, as word spreads among patients and physicians alike. What was once an impossible choice—accept the symptoms or accept the side effects—is becoming a genuine option: treat the disease, preserve the man.
Notable Quotes
The patient today doesn't just want to urinate better. He wants to preserve his quality of life, his continence, and his sexual function.— Dr. Gilberto Chechile
Modern prostate surgery is no longer just about operating well. It's about operating with maximum precision, minimum aggression, and preserving the patient's quality of life.— Dr. Gilberto Chechile
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why does this technology matter so much to patients? It seems like just another surgical tool.
Because for decades, men faced a choice between suffering and losing something essential to their sense of self. Aquabeam® breaks that false choice. It's not just about technique—it's about what you get to keep.
The ejaculation preservation rate is striking. Ninety percent versus twenty percent with lasers. How does that change the conversation with a patient?
It changes everything. A man in his sixties who's been struggling to urinate for years suddenly hears he can be fixed without losing sexual function. That's not a medical detail. That's permission to reclaim his life.
You mention the ultrasound guidance and the robotic precision. Is that really the breakthrough, or is it the saline instead of heat?
Both matter, but the heat is the culprit. Heat spreads. It damages tissue you didn't mean to touch. Saline is surgical, not destructive. The robot just makes sure you're precise about where that saline goes.
What about the men who've already had laser surgery and lost ejaculatory function? Can Aquabeam® help them?
That's the hard question. This technology is about prevention, not reversal. For those men, the conversation is different—and sadder.
So this is really about the future, not about fixing the past.
Exactly. It's about the men coming now, and the millions more who will face this choice in the years ahead.