Robotic motion compensation for bone movement, using ultrasound images

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a robotic motion compensation system, using ultrasound images, to assist orthopedic surgery. The robotic system can compensate for femur movements during bone drilling procedures. Although it may have other applications, the system was thought to be used in hip resurfacing (HR) prosthesis surgery to implant the initial guide tool. The system requires no fiducial markers implanted in the patient, by using only non-invasive ultrasound images. Design/methodology/approach – The femur location in the operating room is obtained by processing ultrasound (USA) and computer tomography (CT) images, obtained, respectively, in the intra-operative and pre-operative scenarios. During surgery, the bone position and orientation is obtained by registration of USA and CT three-dimensional (3D) point clouds, using an optical measurement system and also passive markers attached to the USA probe and to the drill. The system description, image processing, calibration procedures and results with simulated and real experiments are presented and described to illustrate the system in operation. Findings – The robotic system can compensate for femur movements, during bone drilling procedures. In most experiments, the update was always validated, with errors of 2 mm/4°. Originality/value – The navigation system is based entirely on the information extracted from images obtained from CT pre-operatively and USA intra-operatively. Contrary to current surgical systems, it does not use any type of implant in the bone to track the femur movements.