Four-Dimensional Soft Tissue Navigation With Real-Time Tracking
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing image guided surgery systems struggle to accurately navigate instruments within dynamic anatomy due to the lack of real-time tracking and registration of patient motion, particularly during procedures involving organs that move with respiratory or cardiac cycles.
Innovation Solution
A method and apparatus using patient tracking devices with markers and localization elements to continuously track patient motion, allowing for real-time registration and superimposition of pre-procedural images onto intra-procedural images, enhancing navigation accuracy by correlating marker distances and motion sequences.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If pre-procedural images are registered to intra-procedural images using traditional 2D to 3D registration techniques, then registration can be performed, but the system cannot accurately track real-time patient motion and organ movement during the procedure
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces patient tracking devices (PTDs) with markers and localization elements as intermediaries between the imaging system and the moving anatomy. These PTDs are placed on the patient's body and tracked throughout the procedure, serving as mediators that enable continuous monitoring of patient motion and organ displacement, thereby resolving the contradiction between static image registration and dynamic real-time tracking
Solution Approach 2:
The system combines multiple data sources including pre-procedural images, real-time localization data from PTDs, and intra-procedural imaging into a composite navigation model. This integration of heterogeneous data types creates a unified representation that maintains both the anatomical detail from pre-procedural scans and the temporal accuracy from real-time tracking, achieving both registration accuracy and motion tracking reliability
2Measurement precision
If multiple datasets are used to register image space to patient space, then registration accuracy improves, but the device complexity and computational requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the registration process into distinct phases: initial registration using pre-procedural images and PTD markers, and continuous refinement using real-time localization data from multiple datasets. By dividing the complex registration task into manageable segments that can be performed sequentially and independently, the system achieves high accuracy without overwhelming computational complexity
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary registration using easily acquired PTD marker positions before the procedure begins. This initial registration establishes a baseline transformation that can be quickly computed and then refined during the procedure using additional datasets, reducing the computational burden compared to performing full multi-dataset registration from scratch during the procedure
Data Source
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AI summary
A surgical instrument navigation system is provided that visually simulates a virtual volumetric scene of a body cavity of a patient from a point of view of a surgical instrument residing in the cavity of the patient. The surgical instrument navigation system includes: a surgical instrument; an imaging device which is operable to capture scan data representative of an internal region of interest within a given patient; a tracking subsystem that employs electro-magnetic sensing to capture in real-time position data indicative of the position of the surgical instrument; a data processor which is operable to render a volumetric, perspective image of the internal region of interest from a point of view of the surgical instrument; and a display which is operable to display the volumetric perspective image of the patient.