Needle Steering for Robot-Assisted Insertion into Soft Tissue:A Survey

Needle insertion is a common surgical procedure used in diagnosis and treatment.The needle steering technologies make continuous developments in theoretical and practical aspects along with the in-depth research on needle insertion.It is necessary to summarize and analyze the existing results to promote the future development of theories and applications of needle insertion.Thus,a survey of the state of the art of research is presented on algorithms of needle steering techniques,the surgical robots and devices.Based on the analysis of the needle insertion procedure,the concept of needle steering is defined as a kinematics problem,which is to place the needle at the target and avoid the obstacles.The needle steering techniques,including the artificial potential field method and the nonholonomic model,are introduced to control the needles for improving the accuracy.Based on the quasi-static thinking,the virtual spring model and the cantilever-beam model are developed to calculate the amount of needle deflection and generate the needle path.The phantoms instead of the real tissue are used to verify the models mentioned in most of the experimentations.For the desired needle trajectories,the image-guided robotic devices and some novel needles are presented to achieve the needle steering.Finally,the challenges are provided involving the controllability of the long flexible needle and the properties of soft tissue.The results and investigations can be used for further study on the precision and accuracy of needle insertion.

Important Issues of Needle Insertion into Soft Tissue

Needle insertion procedures have been gaining in popularity with medical communities and patients over the recent years.Currently,their applications span a wide range of diagnostic and therapeutic procedures and there is still a growing tenden?cy toward integrating needle insertion into other procedures and surgeries.Its less invasive nature,which is performed locally on the body,largely explains this growing trend.This results in less intraoperative tissue damage and shorter post-operative recovery time.Many procedures like biopsy,deep brain stimulation,and cancer treatments are done using needles/eatheters.However,despite all the advantages of needle insertion procedures,the inherent complications resulting from them,such as tissue deformation,needle deflection,tissue inhomogeneity,patient variability,and associated uncertainty,can hardly be missed.Therefore,a needle insertion procedure requires that we address promising aspects and associated concerns.Against this backdrop,this paper provides a review of some of the main issues associated with a generic needle insertion procedure.