A Robust Uniaxial Force Sensor for Minimally Invasive Surgery

Abstract

This paper presents a novel miniature uniaxial force sensor for use within a beating heart during mitral valve annuloplasty. The sensor measures 5.5 mm in diameter and 12 mm in length and provides a hollow core to pass instrumentation. A soft elastomer flexure design maintains a waterproof seal. Fiber optic transduction eliminates electrical circuitry within the heart, and acetal components minimize ultrasound-imaging artifacts. Calibration uses a nonlinear viscoelastic method, and in vitro tests demonstrate a 0-4-N force range with rms errors of 0.13 N (<3.2%). In vivo tests provide the first endocardial measurements of tissue-minimally invasive surgery instrument interaction forces in a beating heart. Index TermsBeating heart surgery; force feedback; minimally invasive surgery (MIS); mitral valve annuloplasty; optical force sensor

Design, development and preliminary assessment of a force sensor for robotized medical applications

“…MRI requires negligible electromagnetic interference (EMI) sensitivity and to this purpose the optic fiber sensors suit the needs of MRI very well. In the work [9], a uniaxial force sensor using optic fibers compatible with ultrasound imaging was developed for minimally invasive surgery. In contrast, CT-scanner does not have such strict requirements of low EMI sensitivity.…”

V-ANFIS for Dealing with Visual Uncertainty for Force Estimation in Robotic Surgery

“…Method RMS Error(N) % Imp. Yip et al [9] 0.13 75.77 Aviles et al [21] 0.0627 49.76 Faragasso et al [11] 0.1355 76.75 Noohi et al [18] 0.07 55 Our Approach 0.0315 − that it outperforms all the other approaches under comparisons. Moreover, it is worth mentioning that our approach offers a significant percentage of improvement, ranging from about 50% to 77%.…”

“…Research for restoring haptic feedback in RAMIS has mainly been focused on the development of instrument-tissue force sensors that are located at the distal end either close to, or on, the instrument tip [9]- [11]. However biocompatibility and sterilization constraints, size and high cost of the devices, and the difficulty of adapting them to the tool puts severe restrictions on their use in real clinical environments [12], [13].…”

Sensorless force estimation using a neuro-vision-based approach for robotic-assisted surgery

“…The lack of force feedback has motivated some researchers to develop force sensors for restoring this feature to RAMIS [4], [5], [6]. However, biocompatibility and sterilizability problems, space restrictions, long-term stability, devices' high cost and the difficulty of adapting them to the surgical tool, put severe restrictions on their use in real clinical environments [7].…”