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Two areas in which medical robotics has been progressing for several years are rehabilitation and telepresence. I just learned about 2 systems which have demonstrated success in these types of applications. Manus is an arm rehab robot developed at MIT that interfaces with a VR-type game to prompt the patient to perform beneficial motions. It also incorporates adaptive constraint to help guide the patient's motion. I think this is a great use of robots doing what they do best - repetitive mechanical tasks.
The military has had a long-standing interest in medical telepresence. Apparently they are now using a robot called RP-7 to provide basic audio/video communication between patients and doctors. This allows specialists to provide their expertise (make rounds, etc.) even from a long distance away. Here's the thing though. The robot costs a quarter of a million dollars. Why don't they just put some fancy networking in all the hospital rooms and achieve the same thing rather than having a dumb robot wandering around the hospital? Now if the robot could do more than just facilitate communications, or if it were much less expensive, I might have a more positive opinion.
http://bmsmail3.ieee.org:80/u/13832/80596289
http://blogs.spectrum.ieee.org/riskfactor/2008/12/robot_use_in_military_hospital.html