Evaluation of a resectable ultrasound liver phantom for testing of surgical navigation systems

Abstract

A formerly developed ultrasound liver phantom for testing of surgical navigation systems and liver resection trainings was evaluated experimentally. The phantom was scanned with CT and the dataset was analyzed with existing segmentation techniques. A virtual 3D model was generated on the basis of the segmentation; it was later used for phantom registration in a surgical assistance navigation system. Within an experiment, ten test persons have tried to touch three tumor models hidden in the phantom with the tip of a resection instrument. In 67% of overall 30 touch trials it was a successful touch at the first go. It means that the developed liver phantom is appropriate for testing of surgical navigation systems, as well as for computer assisted liver resection trainings.

Anthropomorphic liver phantom with flow for multimodal image-guided liver therapy research and training

“…They designed an anthropomorphic non-rigid phantom for evaluation of CT imaging systems, including vascular structures such as portal and hepatic veins. Liver phantoms with multimodal imaging capabilities are scarce [ 3 , 4 , 19 , 20 ]. Among them, only the phantom presented by Chmarra et al [ 3 ] allows for the combination of ultrasound, CT and MR imaging modalities.…”

“…The authors presented a cost-effective and reusable phantom for development of image-guided therapeutic interventions and diagnostic imaging techniques and systems, consisting of three types of mimicked soft tissues such as liver parenchyma, tumors and blood vessels. Shevchenko et al [ 4 ] also designed a multimodal liver phantom with vascular structures, and a more realistic appearance. They proposed a phantom for testing navigation systems and liver resection training, providing vascular trees and tumor models.…”

“…There are liver phantoms available on the market, or described in the scientific literature, with tumor models, blood vessels structures [ 3 , 4 ] and real appearance [ 4 ], but none of them provide blood flow functionality.…”

“…Some of the latter include vascular structures [ 15 – 17 ] and have a realistic appearance [ 16 , 17 ]. Multimodal liver phantoms are still scarce [ 3 , 4 , 19 , 20 ]. To the best of our knowledge, the present study is the first describing a multimodal liver phantom based on real human liver anatomy, which includes tumor models, vascular structures and blood flow functionality.…”

Dynamic Hepatocellular Carcinoma Model Within a Liver Phantom for Multimodality Imaging

“…The liver phantom can be made using several different tissue-mimicking materials that are compatible with the imaging modalities [ 15 ]. Most of the liver phantoms were developed for applications in CT imaging [ [16] , [17] , [18] , [19] , [20] , [21] , [22] , [23] ], while far less phantoms were intended for MRI [ [24] , [25] , [26] ] and ultrasound [ [27] , [28] , [29] , [30] ]. However, multimodal liver phantoms which can be applied under different medical imaging modalities including MRI, CT, and ultrasound are still less developed [ 12 , 24 , 31 ].…”