SINGAPORE – Pre-school teacher Yusmarni Mohammad Hasni was typing on her laptop in bed in May 2025 when she suddenly felt a sharp pain in her shoulder.
She had lived with chronic shoulder instability – a condition where her shoulder joint often slipped out of place – for 12 years after an injury during judo training in secondary school.
“It affected my daily life. For example, when I was holding on to a handle in the bus, my shoulder would just dislocate,” she said.
Over the years, she learnt how to push her shoulder back into the socket. But on that day in 2025, she was unable to do so.
“I tried to sit up, but I couldn’t,” said Yusmarni, now 27. “I was crying. It was my most painful experience yet.”
She sought treatment at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital (KTPH), where the orthopaedic surgery team decided to use a new keyhole surgery technique developed by the hospital to stabilise her shoulder and prevent future dislocations.
Yusmarni became the first patient in Singapore to undergo the surgery in August 2025.
Keyhole surgery is a minimally invasive method where the operation is done through small incisions. The technique uses smaller skin incisions than open surgery, leaving the patient with smaller surgical scars and less pain during recovery. It also allows surgeons to conduct the operation with more precision through better visualisation.
Although keyhole surgery has been used to treat shoulder instability since the 2000s, it is not widely practised due to its complexity, said consultant surgeon Chan Juen Zhik from KTPH’s shoulder, elbow and sports surgery service.
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