Robot-assisted microsurgical forceps with haptic feedback for transoral laser microsurgery

Area of Science:

• Robotics
• Surgical Technology
• Human-Computer Interaction

Background:

• Manual microsurgical instruments lack precision and ergonomic design.
• Teleoperation systems offer potential for enhanced surgical control but require sophisticated interfaces.
• Haptic feedback is crucial for delicate tissue manipulation in microsurgery.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel motorized, multi-degrees-of-freedom (DoF) microsurgical forceps tool.
• To develop a master-slave teleoperation architecture for improved surgical task simplification.
• To evaluate the system's performance in terms of control, gripping force, and accuracy for operating room applications.

Main Methods:

• Design and implementation of a 7-DoF slave manipulator with integrated force/torque sensing.
• Development of a 7-DoF master haptic interface for teleoperation and feedback.
• Performance evaluation through teleoperation control analysis and gripping force characterization.

Main Results:

• The system achieved an overall positioning error of less than 400 μm.
• The motorized forceps demonstrated precise tissue grip-force measurement and control.
• The master-slave architecture provided intuitive and ergonomic tissue manipulation.

Conclusions:

• The novel microsurgical forceps tool offers improved precision, usability, and ergonomics.
• The system's performance indicates suitability for real surgical scenarios in the operating room.
• This technology has the potential to advance haptic-feedback-enhanced transoral laser microsurgeries.