Towards markerless robot-assisted navigation with 2D-3D registration for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction

Conventional navigation frameworks in orthopaedic surgery use optical tracking to localize objects in the surgical workspace. This approach demonstrates high precision, but requires implanting optical tracking arrays in patient anatomy, leading to increased patient trauma, and further entails manual annotation of anatomic surfaces for registration to array coordinate systems. The current work proposes robot-assisted navigation based on 2D-3D registration to fluoroscopy, which does not rely on optical tracking. The proposed framework was evaluated by performing robot-assisted drilling of femoral tunnels for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Experiments were conducted using synthetic foam bones and excised cadaveric femora. Differences between planned and achieved medial-side tunnel footprints were shown to be below 3 mm on average. Results suggest that markerless navigation systems could support orthopaedic procedures through accurate execution of preoperative plans.