Virtual Surgery
December 30, 2006
"You have to imagine it like this: a surgeon stands in front of a real table that resembles an operating table," said computer scientist Torsten Kuhlen, who is in charge of the research team developing the virtual operating room.
"A video beamer is installed within the table and in conjunction with a pair of 'stereo glasses' which the surgeon wears, a kind of holographic image of the patient is created," Kuhlen said.
The patient, thus, appears as a hologram lying on the "operating table."
Simulating reality
For the whole process to work, the conditions in the virtual operating room must emulate real conditions as much as possible. It's not enough to depict organs, bones, muscles and sinews. For the virtual operating room to be useful as a learning tool, the whole body must be visualized, right down to the various layers of the human skin.
Virtual operating technology must even relay the skin's resistance in order to create a realistic feel of using a scalpel during surgery.
Researchers at the Computing and Communication Center in Aachen have come up with a solution for that. A robot holding a scalpel is placed in front of the operating table. When the surgeon grabs hold of the scalpel and cuts through the virtual skin, the robot generates the tension created by different layers of the human skin.
Achieving this, however, was no easy task for Kuhlen and his colleagues.
"To make the situation realistic, the surgeons want the virtual operating room to correspond with real time," Kuhlen said.
"We have to use and sometimes develop new, very complex mathematics to create the virtual, yet realistic skin layers. This complex mathematical rendering has to happen very fast to correspond with real time. That means up to 60 renderings per second -- 60 images are shown per second," he said.
Advanced medical technology
Virtual realities are often used nowadays in the medical field, particularly during training. Doctors also regularly use virtual simulations to help them plan operations.
Computer scientist Lenka Yerabkova, however, is convinced that the technology being developed in Aachen by far exceeds the currently available systems.
"Current computers applications in the field of medicine can simulate organs and change their shape," Yerabkova said.
"But realistic simulations of cutting through tissue along various lines and at various depths -- just like in a classic operation -- have not been possible until now," she said.
Up-and-coming surgeons
Virtual practice could not only dramatically shorten the length of real operations, but also significantly improve the training of young doctors.
"A university clinic, of course, has lots of young doctors just starting out who need to be trained," said Timm Wolter of Aachen's University Clinic.
"On the other hand, there is a limited number of patients. And some types of operations, which are normally standard, are rarely performed in teaching hospitals," he said.
Such operations, for instance, could be practiced repeatedly in virtual surgery.
Computer researchers in Aachen are still optimizing their technology. It will likely be another five years before the first virtual operations can be performed.