Surgical Debridement Assist Device

To address the Army’s need for a hand-held device to assist surgeons in locating all types of foreign bodies (FB’s) and devitalized tissue during wound debridement procedures, in Phase I, ChromoLogic LLC (CL) has developed and demonstrated a new Debridement And Vitality Assessment by Near Infrared Spectroscopy (DAVANIS) system. DAVANIS is based on frequency domain near infrared (NIR) laser absorption measurements used to diagnose the presence of an FB or devitalized tissue. The Phase I prototype with custom analysis software was capable of determining the presence of a wide range of FB’s that are of interest to the Army embedded within phantom tissue models up to a depth of approximately 40mm. An intrinsic spatial resolution of approximately 0.5mm was demonstrated for the DAVANIS system. Following the successful demonstration of the feasibility of the DAVANIS technology, in Phase II, CL plans to develop a more robust prototype that will include a more powerful illumination system, focusing elements for 3-D isolation of FB’s and enhanced data acquisition that will increase depth resolution to greater than 50mm and enable real time FB detection and vitality diagnosis. Also in Phase II, CL will perform detailed animal studies and file for FDA exemptions.