Interactive Deformation for Surgery Simulation

Computer-based surgery simulation represents a rapidly emerging and increasingly important area of research that combines a number of disciplines for the common purpose of improving health care. Generally, the goal of computer-based surgery simulation is to create environments that support medical education and training by allowing the user to visualize and rehearse clinical, surgical procedures. In this context, surgery simulation systems can ideally provide an efficient, safe, realistic, and relatively economical method for training clinicians in a variety of surgical tasks.

The emphasis in surgery simulation is usually placed on a user's real-time interaction with medical instruments, surgery techniques, and models that represent various anatomical structures and physiological processes. As a result, the development of such a system is a highly interdisciplinary endeavor, integrating methods and techniques from engineering, medicine, and computer science. Indeed, computer science provides a framework for exploring a variety of approaches in interactive 3D graphics, animation, visualization, user interface design, and human-computer interaction, all of which play a very important role in the design of the simulation. This paper presents a methodology that addresses important issues concerned with the underlying graphical models designed for surgical simulation, as well as issues related to the real-time interactivity with, and manipulation of, these models.

We are developing a novel methodology for creating deformable, graphical 3D models that are interactively manipulable and that exhibit a behavior that is not only visually acceptable, but also physically based. The approach is based on the notion of active surfaces which is grounded on physically based descriptions of deformable objects, and can easily be extended to other applications with similar deformation and interactivity requirements. We present recent results obtained from applying these methods to the problem of endoscopic gall bladder surgery simulation.

Images From IEEE: Computer Graphics & Applications Paper

Project Members:

From Georgia Tech

• Dr. Norberto F. Ezquerra
• James F. O'Brien
• Steven A. Cover

From Medical College of Georgia

• Richard Rowe
• Thomas Gadacz
• Ellen Palm

References:

• S. A. Cover, N. F. Ezquerra, J. F. O'Brien, et. al., "Interactively Deformable Models for Surgery Simulation", IEEE: Computer Graphics and Applications, November 1993, Vol 13, No 6., pp. 68-75.