Robotic navigation-assisted percutaneous liver puncture: a pilot study

Area of Science:

• Interventional Radiology
• Medical Robotics
• Oncology

Background:

• Liver cancer often presents at advanced, unresectable stages, necessitating minimally invasive treatments like ablation.
• Accurate needle placement is critical for the success of minimally invasive liver tumor procedures.
• Manual puncture techniques have limitations including steep learning curves, frequent adjustments, and increased radiation exposure.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the safety and efficacy of robotic navigation-assisted puncture (RNAP) for liver tumors.
• To compare RNAP with traditional manual puncture (MP) in terms of key procedural metrics.

Main Methods:

• A comparative study involving 65 patients with liver tumors undergoing percutaneous puncture (ablation, iodine-125 implantation, biopsy).
• Patients were divided into two groups: RNAP (n=29) and MP (n=36).
• Key outcomes measured included technical success, clinical success, puncture score, CT scans, total procedure time, puncture time, irradiation dose, and complications.

Main Results:

• RNAP demonstrated significantly lower puncture scores (P=0.01), shorter puncture times (P=0.01), fewer CT scans (P=0.01), and reduced irradiation doses (P=0.01) compared to MP.
• Technical success (100% vs. 100%) and clinical success (91.5% vs. 91.4%) rates were comparable between the two groups (P>0.99 and P=0.81, respectively).
• Total procedure time and complication rates showed no significant differences between RNAP and MP groups.

Conclusions:

• Robotic navigation-assisted puncture is an effective tool for liver tumor procedures.
• RNAP significantly reduces procedure time, imaging frequency, and radiation exposure.
• RNAP offers comparable safety and efficacy to manual puncture while improving efficiency and reducing patient radiation dose.