A novel pneumatic drill for bone biopsy under MRI imaging

Area of Science:

• Orthopedic Surgery
• Medical Device Engineering
• Radiology

Background:

• Current computed tomography (CT)-guided bone biopsies use battery-powered drills, which offer limited soft tissue discrimination and involve ionizing radiation.
• These limitations necessitate the development of advanced imaging and biopsy techniques for improved diagnostic accuracy and patient safety.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate an MRI-safe pneumatic drill as an alternative to traditional CT-guided bone biopsy methods.
• To compare the drilling time and sample quality obtained using the novel pneumatic drill versus a standard battery-powered drill in an animal model.

Main Methods:

• Five porcine rib bones were utilized for the study.
• Each bone specimen was subjected to drilling with both an 11-gauge battery-powered drill and a newly developed pneumatically actuated drill.
• Drilling time for each sample was recorded using a stopwatch.

Main Results:

• All 20 bone samples obtained from both drills exhibited high-quality inner cores and intact cortices.
• The average drilling time for the pneumatic drill was 8.5 ± 2.5 seconds, compared to 7.1 ± 1.4 seconds for the battery-powered drill.
• The pneumatic drill demonstrated slightly longer drilling times, with an average difference of 1.39 seconds.

Conclusions:

• Both the pneumatic and battery-powered drills successfully acquired comparable bone biopsy specimens.
• The pneumatic drill's slightly increased drilling time is considered clinically insignificant.
• The developed MRI-safe pneumatic drill holds promise for enabling radiation-free bone biopsies with enhanced lesion visualization under MRI guidance.