Fluorescence Imaging Background Surgical Image Selective Illumination
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current minimally invasive surgical systems face challenges in identifying specific tissue types during surgeries, as certain tissues are difficult to distinguish due to obscuration by other tissues, and existing image fusion methods can be fatiguing and introduce temporal delays or latency, leading to motion artifacts.
Innovation Solution
A minimally invasive surgical system that simultaneously illuminates a surgical site with less than all visible color illumination components and a fluorescence excitation component, capturing and superimposing fluorescence images in real-time onto a background black and white image, reducing latency and memory requirements, and ensuring synchronized highlighting of tissues of clinical interest.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If separate picture in picture (PIP) display is used to show additional image information, then the surgeon can see more tissue details, but the smaller picture size reduces the level of detailed information and causes mental fatigue from fusing two separate images
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the fluorescence image and the visible light image into a single composite image displayed on one screen. The image fusion module combines these images with different transparency levels, allowing the surgeon to view both tissue types simultaneously in one unified display, eliminating the need to mentally fuse separate PIP images and reducing visual fatigue while preserving all tissue detail information
2Loss of information
If time slicing method is used to superimpose fluorescence image on visible image, then both images can be displayed, but temporal delay and latency are introduced causing motion artifacts
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements continuous simultaneous capture of both fluorescence and visible light images without temporal separation. The system captures both image types at the same moment and processes them through the image fusion module in real-time, eliminating the temporal delays and motion artifacts associated with time slicing methods while maintaining complete image overlay information
3Loss of information
If frame storage and subsequent processing is used to combine images, then image fusion can be achieved, but memory requirements and processing complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs preliminary real-time processing of fluorescence and visible light images as they are captured, immediately combining them through the image fusion module without storing complete frames for later processing. This approach maintains full image fusion capability while reducing memory requirements and processing complexity by handling images in a continuous stream rather than storing and retrospectively processing discrete frames
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach provides a real-time, latency-free, and synchronized display of tissue details, enhancing surgical precision by clearly highlighting tissues of interest without introducing motion artifacts, thus improving surgical efficiency and reducing the risk of tissue damage.
Implementation Method 1
a fluorescence image excited by the fluorescence excitation illumination component
Data Source
AI summary
A surgical site is simultaneously illuminated by less than all the visible color components that make up visible white light, and a fluorescence excitation illumination component by an illuminator in a minimally invasive surgical system. An image capture system acquires an image for each of the visible color components illuminating the surgical site and a fluorescence image, which is excited by the fluorescence excitation component from the illuminator. The minimally invasive surgical system uses the acquired images to generate a background black and white image of the surgical site. The acquired fluorescence image is superimposed on the background black and white image, and is highlighted in a selected color, e.g., green. The background black and white image with the superimposed highlighted fluorescence image is displayed for a user of the system. The highlighted fluorescence image identifies tissue of clinical interest.