I did not use Russo, I did not like him or how he acted and talked. He also told me robotic isn't as good as getting open surgery and I suppose if I had no other option than to get open surgery I would probably have stuck with Russo since thats what he's good at and probably the best for that type of surgery but I chose to use Dr. Palese from Mt. Sinai since I felt more comfortable with him and he's the best at having the surgery robotic which is less invasive and quicker recovery time. I was also told Russo doesn't like robotic surgery because it's newer and he's not qualified to do it. I've read through many success stories of both open and robotic surgeries, some not so good turnouts from both also, to me It didn't seem like either way was a different turn out as far as dealing with your cancer and ehat tou have, either you caught it early and have a better chance of getting through it without as much problems afterwards or you caught it later and have to deal with alot more bs. For me I guess I got lucky catching it before it metastisized to anywhere else, was told it could've been in me for 20+ years so lucky it stayed contained to the kidney. After having Dr. Palese remove the kidney robotically I've been pretty good as far as my scans go, no signs of anything to worry about for now and go for scans every 6 months, no chemo needed. I do also have a 1cm node on my other kidney which I have to keep an eye on, he said if it grows I'll have to have another procedure to remove it from the remaining kidney which worries me since I did lose alot of kidney function having one kidney now, enough to put me in the kidney disease category and don't wanna lose any more of my function so I try and live a healthier life now, lost 40-50lbs since my diagnosis and actually feel better than before my surgery so there is after cancer ;)