Simulating haptic feedback of abdomen organs on Laparoscopic Surgery Tools

Minimally invasive surgeries (MIS) such as laparoscopic procedures are widely used for many types of abdomen surgeries because of its numerous advantages over open surgeries. They require very high level of skills of surgeons acquired through experience. The best and the safest way of getting hands on experience is the computer simulation or virtual reality (VR). The VR surgical simulators have a great potential to revolutionize the training paradigm of surgical interns. The haptic feedback plays as equally asvisual feedback to provide realistic environment to trainees. In this paper, we present a method incorporate hapitics on VR simulator. A software procedure is developed using the Libraries of Open Haptic Toolkit along with the Open GL graphic libraries to implement three basic haptic ranges: soft, mild(firm) and hard into organ models. The feedback of the expert surgeons in the field was obtained to model the organs rather than measuring mechanical properties of soft tissues due to practical limitations. A commercially available six Degrees of Freedom (DoF) position sensing and three DoF force feedback haptic devices are used to implement the interface

Disease detection system from heart sounds

This paper presents a methodology to diagnose some heart diseases which can be identified using heart sounds. As the first stage, audio files in . wav format are acquired using an electronic stethoscope and entered to a database with patient symptoms. Prominent features and statistical parameters needed for disease detection are extracted from the heart sound samples using some algorithm. Patient's heart sound fde and symptoms are given as inputs to the developed software for analysis to find out the diseases

Mobile based wound measurement

This paper proposes a portable wound area measurement method based on the segmentation of digital images. Its objective is to provide a practical, fast and non-invasive technique for medical staff to monitor the healing process of chronic wounds. Segmentation is based on active contour models which identifies the wound border irrespective of coloration and shape. The initial segmentation can also be modified by the user, providing higher control and accuracy. Area measurements are further normalized to remove effects of camera distance and angle. The application has been implemented for the Android platform version 2.2 with a prototype model running on Samsung Galaxy Tab. The results to evaluate the efficacy of the application have been encouraging with an accuracy level of 90

Automated whole slide imaging for conventional optical microscopes

Optical microscopes are used to observe magnified views of specimens that are infinitesimal to be directly observed by the human eye. They are commonly used in histopathology, where urgent reports are often crucial in decision-making. However, dependance on microscope technicians has several identified drawbacks, such as, the field of view being only available to the technician and continuous observation of slides inducing human errors. Furthermore, prolonged use of microscopes can lead to severe eye injuries. To address these issues, Whole Slide Imaging (WSI) microscopes, capable of automatically digitizing slides, are available in the market with a high price tag. However, these systems do not provide the user with the ability to change lenses and it is well known that some users have specific brand preferences in microscope lenses and systems. As a solution, this paper presents a method to enhance the functionality of a conventional optical microscope into a WSI microscope by motorizing the navigator and the fine-tune knob. An eyepiece camera is used to obtain photographs synchronously at predefined positions. The obtained images are then registered and stitched to generate a WSI, directly comparable with the output from the microscope. These images have various applications, such as, teaching, collaborative decision making and computer-aided-diagnostics

A Portable remote medical consultation system for the use of distant rural communities

Remote medical monitoring and consultation has become indispensable in order to enhance the availability of better health-care services to the patients in remote rural areas in the country. This paper proposes an inexpensive, easy to handle Remote Medical Consultation System (RMCS) which supports the healthcare workers to carry out their services through bi-directional video and voice communication between the remote end and doctor’s end as well as automated measuring of medical parameters that can be controlled from both ends. RMCS is consisted of a wearable sensors kit, a centralized hardware platform which connects to the medical sensors and devices and a software platform with database for operating and managing the system. RMCS is capable of remotely measuring patient’s blood pressure, heart rate, body temperature, electrocardiogram (ECG), heart sounds and the system’s platform supports to add-on more medical sensors or devices. The key aspect of the system is that it reduces most of the complexity in operation and facilitates the doctors to monitor and diagnose the patients in real-time. RMCS was essentially developed to eliminate the issues of low quality healthcare services in rural areas and to assist in monitoring immobilized patients