Patent ID: 7780681

Claim:
A computer assisted, non-radiological method of intra-operatively measuring and assessing relative geometric relationships among skeletal features of a hip joint, suitable for surgical navigation of a hip arthroplasty operation, comprising the steps of: touching, with a trackable probe, at least three superficial points corresponding to respective recognizable anatomic features of the pelvis and tracking said probe with a locating system; processing the tracking data for said trackable probe with software executable on a computer so as to define a pelvic plane without reference to previously obtained radiological data; tracking with said locating system the orientation of an acetabular implant tool which is coupled to an acetabular implant, to obtain acetabular implant orientation data; adjusting said acetabular implant into a desired orientation with respect to said defined pelvic plane, without reference to previously obtained radiological data, by relating said acetabular implant orientation data to said defined pelvic plane; touching, with a trackable probe, at least three points on said acetabular implant and tracking said probe with said locating system; based on the tracked locations of said at least three points on said acetabular implant, calculating an orientation of said acetabular implant; and comparing the calculated orientation of said acetabular implant to said desired orientation to verify proper orientation of the acetabular implant.