Minimally Invasive Surgical Planning and Training System

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The goal of this project is development of an interactive, image-guided surgery (IIGS) system for use in laparoscopic liver surgery and ablation. This system will permit clinicians to use preoperative volumetric images obtained using computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance (MR) imaging during surgery as a means of navigational guidance. The efficacy of image-guided surgery has been demonstrated in neurosurgery. However, application of the technology to other fields of surgery has been slow. During this project, we plan to address one of the primary technical barriers by developing an endoscopic system for measurement of the shape and deformation of organs during minimally invasive surgery. The resulting data will be used for coregistration of patient and image coordinate systems and to drive deformable tissue models. The Phase II work will be evaluated using a series of phantom and experimental animal tests performed at Creare and Vanderbilt University.