Patent ID: 6275725
Filing Date: 2001-08-14
Classification: A61B,A61N,G06K,G06T

Abstract:
A process for providing a simultaneous display of representations showing the positional relationship of a surgical instrument in a computer graphics display of a patient's anatomy, said process using stereotactic image-scanner data representing the patient's anatomy and referencing the stereotactic imagine-scanner data in scanner-data coordinates, said process comprising the steps of:storing the stereotactic image-scanner data representing the patient's anatomy and referenced in scanner-data coordinates;optically sensing plural different fields of view of the patient's anatomy in real time with a plurality of cameras each of said different fields of view containing a surgical field of the patient's anatomy and the surgical instrument, whereby to provide location data on the surgical instrument relative to the patient's anatomy and referenced in camera coordinates;transforming the location data on said surgical instrument referenced in the camera coordinates to transformed surgical-instrument data referenced in coordinates other than said camera coordinates;combining the transformed surgical-instrument data and the stereotactic image-scanner data to form combined display data referenced in said scanner-data coordinates to provided display signals; anddriving a computer graphics display with the combined display data to simultaneously display an image currently representative of the surgical instrument related to the patient's anatomy.