Dual-camera infrared guidance for computed tomography biopsy procedures

Dual-camera infrared guidance for computed tomography biopsy procedures

A CT-guided biopsy is a specialised surgical procedure whereby a needle is used to withdraw tissue or fluid specimen from a lesion of interest. The needle is guided while being viewed by a clinician on a computed tomography (CT) scan. CT guided biopsies invariably expose patients and operators to high dosage of radiation and are lengthy procedures where the lack of spatial referencing while guiding the needle along the required entry path
are some of the diffculties currently encountered. This research focuses on addressing two of the challenges clinicians currently face when performing CT-guided biopsy procedures.

The first challenge is the lack of spatial referencing during a biopsy procedure, with the requirement for improved accuracy and reduction in the number of repeated scans. In order to achieve this an infrared navigation system was designed and implemented where an existing approach was subsequently extended to help guide the clinician in advancing the biopsy needle. This extended algorithm computed a scaled estimate of the needle endpoint and assists with navigating the biopsy needle through a dedicated and custom built graphical user interface.

The second challenge was to design and implement a training environment where clinicians could practice different entry angles and scenarios. A prototype training module was designed and built to provide simulated biopsy procedures in order to help increase spatial referencing. Various experiments and different scenarios were designed and tested
to demonstrate the correctness of the algorithm and provide real-life simulated scenarios where the operators had a chance to practice different entry angles and familiarise themselves with the equipment. A comprehensive survey was also undertaken to investigate the advantages and disadvantages of the system.