Vascular interventional surgery has its advantages compared to traditional operation. Master-slave robotic technology can further improve the operation accuracy, efficiency and safety of this complicated and high risk surgery. However, on-line acquisition of operating force information of catheter and guidewire remains to be a significant obstacle on the path to enhancing robotic surgery safety. Thus, a novel slave manipulator is proposed in this paper to realize on-line sensing of guidewire torsional operating torque and axial operation force during robotic assisted operations. A strain sensor is specially designed to detect the small scale torsional operation torque with low rotational frequency. Additionally, the axial operating force is detected via a load cell, which is incorporated into a sliding mechanism to eliminate the influence of friction. For validation, calibration and performance evaluation experiments are conducted. The results indicate that the proposed operation torque and force detection device is effective. Thus, it can provide the foundation for enabling accurate haptic feedback to the surgeon to improve surgical safety.

Operating force information on-line acquisition of a novel slave manipulator for vascular interventional surgery

A robotically assisted catheterization system can obviously reduce the radiation exposure to the surgeon and lesson the fatigue caused by standing for long time in protective clothing. However, effective detection and feedback of proximal force signals is essential to the success of a surgery. This paper presents a compact, cost-effective force-sensing device based on strain gauges, for our team developed slave side, to measure the proximal force signals of the input catheter. A significant advantage is that the proposed sensing device can detect the force signals directly without any mechanical transmission, and this can increase the measurement accuracy of force information. In addition, a haptic interface based on MR fluid is designed to provide a realistic sense of operation according to the force signals from the slave side, so as to improve the safety and success of a surgery. Comparing experimental results from an insertion test and a load cell, show that the average error for force measurement is less than 0.01 N. This research provides important insights into the design of compact, ergonomic, robotic catheter manipulators for intraoperative navigation using effective tactile sensing devices.

Performance evaluation of a strain-gauge force sensor for a haptic robot-assisted catheter operating system

In this paper, we proposed a novel master-slave robotic catheterization system with force feedback for VIS (Vascular Interventional Surgery). The force feedback to the operator on the master side is the key factor to improve the safety during VIS. The developed system used the MR (magneto rheological) fluid to realize force feedback, and it used the developed multidimensional monitoring interface to realize the visualization of force feedback, the developed multidimensional monitoring interface can monitor the motion information of the catheter and contact force between catheter tip or side wall and blood vessel wall, and the motion data of the catheter was collected and generated diagram for reference to surgeon. We have developed a force sensor array to detect the contact force between catheter tip or side wall and blood vessel wall. The force information was detected by the developed contact force sensor array when the catheter contacted with the blood vessel. The force feedback and multidimensional information monitoring interface evaluation experiments were done, the tracking characteristic evaluation experiments were also carried out, the experimental results indicated that the developed novel robotic catheterization system with force feedback and visualization of force feedback is effective for VIS, it can improve the safety during VIS.

Design and characteristics evaluation of a novel teleoperated robotic catheterization system with force feedback for vascular interventional surgery.

The robot-assisted catheter system can increase operating distance thus preventing the exposure radiation of the surgeon to X-ray for endovascular catheterization. However, few designs have considered the collision protection between the catheter tip and the vessel wall. This paper presents a novel catheter operating system based on tissue protection to prevent vessel puncture caused by collision. The integrated haptic interface not only allows the operator to feel the real force feedback, but also combines with the newly proposed collision protection mechanism (CPM) to mitigate the collision trauma. The CPM can release the catheter quickly when the measured force exceeds a certain threshold, so as to avoid the vessel puncture. A significant advantage is that the proposed mechanism can adjust the protection threshold in real time by the current according to the actual characteristics of the blood vessel. To verify the effectiveness of the tissue protection by the system, the evaluation experiments in vitro were carried out. The results show that the further collision damage can be effectively prevented by the CPM, which implies the realization of relative safe catheterization. This research provides some insights into the functional improvements of safe and reliable robot-assisted catheter systems.

Design and performance evaluation of collision protection-based safety operation for a haptic robot-assisted catheter operating system

Performance of robot-assisted endovascular surgery (ES) remains highly dependent on an individual surgeon's skills, due to common adoption of master-slave robotic structure. Surgeons' skill modeling and unstructured surgical state perception pose prohibitive challenges for an autonomous ES robot. In this paper, a novel convolutional neural network (CNN)-based framework is proposed to address these challenges for navigation of an ES robot based on surgeons' skill learning. An operating action probability estimator is proposed by integrating a two-dimensional CNN, with which the features of a surgical state image are extracted and then directly mapped to the action probability. A one-dimensional CNN with multi-input is developed to recognize the guide wire operating force condition. An eye-hand collaborative servoing algorithm is proposed to combine the outputs of these two networks and to control the robot under a closed-loop architecture. A real-world ES robot is employed for data collection and task performance evaluation in laboratory condition. Compared with the state of the art, the CNN-based method shows its capability of adapting to different situations and achieves similar success rate and average operating time. Robotic operation performs similar operating trajectory and maintains similar level of operating force with manual operation. The CNN-based method can be easily extended to many other surgical robots. Graphical abstract A surgeon's guide wire operating skills in endovascular surgery (ES) is learned by the proposed CNN-based method. Then, the learned model is used for autonomous control of a ES robot with surgical state input (images and operating force).

A CNN-based prototype method of unstructured surgical state perception and navigation for an endovascular surgery robot.

Vascular interventional surgery (VIS) is an effective treatment method for vascular diseases However, there are many problems in traditional VIS, such as surgeons are radiated by X-ray, the lack of well skilled surgeons, the security of the surgery will be reduced due to the Surgeons' fatigue, high risk of the surgery To solve these problems, a robotic catheter system is needed to protect the surgeons and enhance the safety of the surgery In this paper, a novel robotic catheter system with master---slave structure for VIS has been developed This system is designed with the consideration of the operation method in traditional VIS, which allows the surgeon to operate a real catheter on the master side, then the surgeon make full use of the natural catheter manipulation experience and skills obtained in conventional catheter operation The salve manipulator operates the catheter insert into the blood vessel with following the operation of the surgeon, and the operating force of the salve manipulator is detected On the master side, a novel damper-based magnetorheological (MR) fluid is designed to realize the force feedback, which is also used to reappear the operation force from the salve manipulator The damper connected directly with real catheter is a piston structure using the MR fluid to realize the force feedback It can transmit the feedback force to surgeon's hand through the operating catheter connected with damper, which seems that the surgeon operates the catheter beside the patient The operating transparency of the developed system has been enhanced The mechanism of the developed system has been introduced in detail Performance evaluation experiments for the developed robotic catheter system have been done The experimental results indicated that the developed robotic catheter system is fit for VIS

Design and performance evaluation of a novel robotic catheter system for vascular interventional surgery

A slave manipulator device for the auxiliary system of a main and slave minimally invasive blood vessel interventional surgery is characterized by comprising an axial pushing unit, a rotary unit, a clamping unit, a surgery catheter, an operation force detection unit and a dip angle adjustable base; a work method comprises the steps of signal detection, transmission, processing and operation The slave manipulator device has the advantages that the interventional operation actions of a doctor can be simulated, the operation precision is high, and surgery safety is effectively improved; the aim that an angle expected by an operator can be adjusted for different treated patients or different interventional positions is ensured; the whole device is made of an aluminum alloy material, and is small in size and light in weight

Slave manipulator device for auxiliary system of main and slave minimally invasive blood vessel interventional surgery

A master end operator device of a master slave minimal invasive blood vessel interventional surgical assistant system is characterized by comprising an axial force feedback damper unit, a torsion feedback output unit, a clamp unit, an operation information unit, a catheter, a linear guide rail and a height-adjustable base; a work method of the device comprises detection, transmission, processing and action of signals; the device has the advantages that the catheter is directly operated, and the ergonomic demands are met; real-time and intuitive feedback is realized, and the surgical safety and operation demands of a doctor are met; axial operation information is obtained by a friction-free magnetic induction mode, and efficiency is realized without adding the load; the height is adjustable.

Master end operator device of master slave minimal invasive blood vessel interventional surgical assistant system

This paper proposed a novel grasper for a novel master-slave robotic catheter navigation system in Vascular Interventional Surgery (VIS). The developed novel grasper can imitate the catheter grasping motion of the surgeon during VIS. The grasper is a key factor to drive the catheter into the vessel accurately. It adopts a common structure like the pliers, which can guarantee that the catheter can be clamped on the same axes with other via hole. The clamping force can be adjusted by the screw through changing the entered length of the screw to change the compression length of the spring. The clamping system consists of two graspers both master side and slave side respectively. The graspers clamp the catheter just like the surgeon's hand and the clamping method of the grasper imitates the surgeon's operation. The performance evaluation experiments of the novel grasper were done. The experimental results indicated that the grasper was effective to clamp catheter tightly to increase accuracy of surgery, which can satisfy the design demand.

http://www.guolab.org/Papers/2014/ICIA20140063.pdf

Performance evaluation of the novel grasper for a robotic catheter navigation system

In Vascular Interventional Surgery (VIS), the surgeons are exposed to X-ray threatening the surgeons' health due to the depositing which lasts long. It is significant to find a method to keep away from X-ray during VIS. In this paper, a novel master-slave robotic catheter system for VIS has been proposed. The surgeon operates a real catheter on the master side, which can make full use of the natural catheter manipulation experience and skills obtained in conventional catheter navigation. The feedback of catheter operating force on the master side plays an important role in improving the safety of the vascular surgery. In order to realize the force feedback, a damper is used based on the intelligent fluid magnetorheological (MR) fluid. The damper is a piston structure with MR fluid. It can transmit the force feedback to surgeon's hand through the operating catheter from the control of master controller, which seems that the surgeon operates the catheter beside the patient. The feedback force evaluation experiments of the damper were done. The experimental results indicated that the damper was effective for realizing the force feedback of the master-slave system. It can provide force feedback to the surgeon in real time.

/pdf/feedback-force-evaluation-for-a-novel-robotic-catheter-1ujyz7aflq.pdf

Shao Lin

Papers

Design and performance evaluation of a novel robotic catheter system for vascular interventional surgery

Slave manipulator device for auxiliary system of main and slave minimally invasive blood vessel interventional surgery

Master end operator device of master slave minimal invasive blood vessel interventional surgical assistant system

Performance evaluation of the novel grasper for a robotic catheter navigation system

Feedback force evaluation for a novel robotic catheter navigation system