EM tracking can provide effective assistance to surgeons or interventional radiologists during procedures performed in a clinical or CBCT environment. Applications in the CT scanner demand precalibration to provide acceptable performance.
The advanced nonholonomic EKF is effective in reducing EM measurement errors when reconstructing catheter paths, is robust to path curvature and sensor speed, and runs in real time. Our approach is promising for a plurality of clinical procedures requiring catheter reconstructions, such as cardiovascular interventions, pulmonary applications (Bender et al. in medical image computing and computer-assisted intervention-MICCAI 99. Springer, Berlin, pp 981-989, 1999), and brachytherapy.
Purpose: Catheter path reconstruction is a necessary step in many clinical procedures, such as cardiovascular interventions and high-dose-rate brachytherapy. To overcome limitations of standard imaging modalities, electromagnetic tracking has been employed to reconstruct catheter paths. However, tracking errors pose a challenge in accurate path reconstructions. We address this challenge by means of a filtering technique incorporating the electromagnetic measurements with the nonholonomic motion constraints of the sensor inside a catheter.Methods: The nonholonomic motion model of the sensor within the catheter and the electromagnetic measurement data were integrated using an extended Kalman filter. The performance of our proposed approach was experimentally evaluated using the Ascension's 3D Guidance trakStar electromagnetic tracker. Sensor measurements were recorded during insertions of an electromagnetic sensor (model 55) along ten predefined ground truth paths. Our method was implemented in MATLAB and applied to the measurement data. Our reconstruction results were compared to raw measurements as well as filtered measurements provided by the manufacturer.Results: The mean of the root-mean-square (RMS) errors along the ten paths was 3.7 mm for the raw measurements, and 3.3 mm with manufacturer's filters. Our approach effectively reduced the mean RMS error to 2.7 mm.Conclusion: Compared to other filtering methods, our approach successfully improved the path reconstruction accuracy by exploiting the sensor's nonholonomic motion constraints in its formulation. Our approach seems promising for a variety of clinical procedures involving reconstruction of a catheter path.
Purpose: Electromagnetic (EM) tracking of ultrasound (US) probes has been introduced to expand US imaging capabilities and benefit challenging procedures. However, various instruments-including the US probe itself-may introduce dynamic distortions to the EM field, and compromise the EM measurements. Basic filtering methods, such as those provided by manufacturers, are usually inefficient as they do not allow for field distortion compensation. We propose to use a simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) algorithm to track the transrectal US (TRUS) probe while dynamically detect, map, and correct the EM field distortions. Methods: Combining the motion model of the tracked probe, the observations made by a few redundant EM sensors, and the field distortions map, the SLAM algorithm relied on an extended Kalman filter (EKF) to estimate the tracking measurements. The SLAM technique was experimentally validated in a brachytherapy suite. Tracking of a TRUS probe was performed by means of an Ascension trakSTAR tracking system and four EM sensors. In addition, an optical tracking system was employed to provide a ground truth to our data. The performance of the SLAM technique was analysed by varying pertinent parameters, such as the number of redundant measurements and the motion trajectory. Probe trajectories included longitudinal translation, rotation, and freehand motions (consisting of simultaneous longitudinal translation and rotation motions) in order to comprehensively simulate imaging scenarios. Finally, the accuracy of the SLAM estimations was compared with that of the standard filtering methods provided by the manufacturer, as well as that of a simpler sensor fusion technique. Results: SLAM efficiently reduced position tracking errors up to 46.4% during freehand motions of the TRUS probe. Moreover, higher SLAM estimation accuracies were observed as the number of redundant measurements increased. While both TRUS probe motions did not yield a clinically significant trend on position tracking accuracy, orientation measurements were considerably improved during translation of the TRUS probe. Conclusions: The SLAM technique was effective in increasing the tracking accuracy of the TRUS probe. Higher number of redundant sensors and favorable sensor configurations improved the SLAM estimations of EM measurements. In turn, SLAM can further encourage the introduction of EM tracking assistance in clinical procedures such as prostate brachytherapy.
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