Eye Explorer: A robotic endoscope holder for eye surgery

Abstract

Background Holding endoscopes by hand when performing eye surgery reduces the dexterity of the surgeon. Methods A robotic endoscope holder called “Eye Explorer” is proposed to hold the endoscope and free the surgeon's hand. Results This device satisfies the engineering and clinical requirements of eye surgery. The force for manual operation is less than 0.5 N. The observable ranges inside the patient's eye considering horizontal and vertical perspectives are 118° and 97°, and the motion of the holder does not interfere with the surgeon's hand and other surgical devices. The self‐weight compensation can prevent the endoscope from falling when extra supporting force is released. When comparing the external force exerted on the eye by the Eye Explorer with that in case of manual operation, a decrease of more than 15% can be observed. Moreover, the consumption time of endoscope view adjustment using the Eye Explorer and manual operation does not significantly differ. Conclusion The Eye Explorer allows dual‐hand operation, facilitating a successful endoscopic eye surgery.

Real‐time fundus reconstruction and intraocular mapping using an ophthalmic endoscope

“…Figure 3 shows the robotic endoscope holder, which has three active linear degrees of freedom (DOFs) and five rotational passive DOFs. The details of the hardware design, safety measures, control methods and performance evaluation are introduced in Zhou et al 9 . In this study, we use a new version of the robotic endoscope holder.…”

“…By implementing the aforementioned method to all n pixels in the endoscopic image, we obtain the positions of their corresponding fundus parts ðx w ; y w ; z w Þ T ; which are represented by blue cubes in Moreover, the proposed method would be robust to the unpredictable movement of the eyeball during surgery because the fundus reconstruction and eyeball estimation can be accomplished in realtime by simply using the present endoscopic image. The details of the hardware design, safety measures, control methods and performance evaluation are introduced in Zhou et al 9 In this study, we use a new version of the robotic endoscope holder. We improved the manner of approaching the patients' eyes to obtain a larger space for hand operation.…”

“…Therefore, the authors proposed a robotic endoscope holder facilitating endoscopic eye surgery by freeing the surgeon's hand to allow dual‐hand operation. This device can satisfy the engineering and clinical requirements of eye surgery, such as easy sterilisation, easy manual operability, compatibility with the operation space, and safety 9 . Figure 1 shows the appearance of using the proposed device.…”

“…This device can satisfy the engineering and clinical requirements of eye surgery, such as easy sterilisation, easy manual operability, compatibility with the operation space, and safety. 9 Figure 1 shows the appearance of using the proposed device.…”