Fused video and ultrasound images for minimally invasive partial nephrectomy: a phantom study

The shift to minimally invasive abdominal surgery has increased reliance on image guidance during surgical procedures. However, these images are most often presented independently, increasing the cognitive workload for the surgeon and potentially increasing procedure time. When warm ischemia of an organ is involved, time is an important factor to consider. To address these limitations, we present a more intuitive visualization that combines images in a common augmented reality environment. In this paper, we assess surgeon performance under the guidance of the conventional visualization system and our fusion system using a phantom study that mimics the tumour resection of partial nephrectomy. The RMS error between the fused images was 2.43mm, which is sufficient for our purposes. A faster planning time for the resection was achieved using our fusion visualization system. This result is a positive step towards decreasing risks associated with long procedure times in minimally invasive abdominal interventions.