Your doctor may recommend minimally invasive surgery — also called laparoscopic surgery — for several conditions.

In minimally invasive procedures, your doctor makes one or more incisions, each about a half-inch long, to insert a tube. The number of incisions depends on the type of surgery.

The tube or tubes let the doctor slip in tiny video cameras and specially designed surgical instruments to perform the procedure.

When you have minimally invasive surgery, you’re likely to lose less blood and have less postoperative pain, fewer and smaller scars, and a faster recovery than you would after open surgery. Depending on your condition, you may need only a short hospital stay.

For some conditions, your doctor may recommend robotic surgery. That technology gives your doctor great precision, flexibility and control by providing a magnified, 3-D view of the surgical site.