Fil-Am doctor performs first robotic surgery in Northern Florida

Dr. Cedric J. Ortiguera performed the robotic surgery at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida. CONTRIBUTED

JACKSONVILLE, Florida – A Filipino American doctor recently performed the first robotic surgery at the Mayo Clinic here. The procedure was also the first to be done in all of Northern Florida.

Dr. Cedric J. Ortiguera performed the robotic surgery, which is a type of minimally invasive surgery using miniaturized surgical instruments that fit through a series of quarter-inch incisions instead of large ones.

He was born and grew up on Long Island, New York in June 1968. He graduated magna cum laude in biochemistry at Stony Brook University of the State University of New York (SUNY). He earned his medical degree at New York University, also with honors.

Ortiguera did his orthopedic residency at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota with subspecialty in sports orthopedics. He joined the surgical Staff of Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville in 2000.

Ortiguera is also an assistant professor of surgery at the Mayo Medical School and lectures at orthopedic conferences in South America and Central America, as well as in some medical centers in the US.

Ortiguera is the son of two retired medical doctors who were graduates of the University of Santo Tomas in 1963–Dr. Jose Ortiguera, a gastroenterologist in Queens, New York, and Dr. Aida Domingo, a pediatrician and primary care physician for the New York State of Mental Health.