Biopsy Needle Puncture Path Planning Method based on 3D Ultrasound Images

Minimally invasive surgery plays an important role in today's medical care. In the percutaneous insertion, the flexible needles have huge advantages. But due to the mechanical effect, the flexible needle will bend in the organs. So the advancing path must be planned before. In this paper, a path planning method based on a mechanical model is proposed. We improve the exploring algorithm and propose a cure path planning method using equal-radius arc which can avoid big return in the path. For practical need, we set the main obstacle as blood vessels. A blood vessel recognizing method is also proposed. Our path planning method concentrate on the following problems: 1) meet the physical characteristics of flexible needle; 2) reduce large return in the path; 3) reduce harm on the tissue. We choose the best path according to two indexes: rotating time and arc length. The simulation results of our blood vessel recognition and path planning method show that it can satisfy the practical demand.