What quantitative mechanical loading stimulates in vitro cultivation best?

Articular cartilage has limited regeneration capacities. One of the factors that appear to affect the in vitro cultivation of articular cartilage is mechanical stimulation. So far, no combination of parameters has been identified that offers the best results. The goal is to review the literature in search of the best available set of...

A gesture-based design tool: Assessing 2DOF vs. 4DOF steerable instrument control

Iterative prototyping is costly and time-consuming. Particularly when designing medical instruments, human factors related design choices significantly impact performance and safety. A tool is presented that allows for the evaluation of steerable instrument controls before the onset of the prototyping stage. The design tool couples gestural...

Diffuse reflectance spectroscopy for breach detection during pedicle screw placement: a first in vivo investigation in a porcine model

BACKGROUND: The safe and accurate placement of pedicle screws remains a critical step in open and minimally invasive spine surgery, emphasizing the need for intraoperative guidance techniques. Diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) is an optical sensing technology that may provide intraoperative guidance in pedicle screw placement. PURPOSE:...

Availability, procurement, training, usage, maintenance and complications of electrosurgical units and laparoscopic equipment in 12 African countries

Background<br/>Strategies are needed to increase the availability of surgical equipment in low‐ and middle‐income countries (LMICs). This study was undertaken to explore the current availability, procurement, training, usage, maintenance and complications encountered during use of electrosurgical units (ESUs) and laparoscopic equipment.<br/><br/...

A Life Cycle Assessment of reprocessing face masks during the Covid-19 pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic led to threatening shortages in healthcare of medical products such as face masks. Due to this major impact on our healthcare society an initiative was conducted between March and July 2020 for reprocessing of face masks from 19 different hospitals. This exceptional opportunity was used to study the costs impact and the...

Proton density fat fraction of the spinal column: an MRI cadaver study

Background: The increased popularity of minimally invasive spinal surgery calls for a revision of guidance techniques to prevent injuries of nearby neural and vascular structures. Lipid content has previously been proposed as a distinguishing criterion for different bone tissues to provide guidance along the interface of cancellous and...

Generic surgical process model for minimally invasive liver treatment methods

Surgical process modelling is an innovative approach that aims to simplify the challenges involved in improving surgeries through quantitative analysis of a well-established model of surgical activities. In this paper, surgical process model strategies are applied for the analysis of different Minimally Invasive Liver Treatments (MILTs),...

Pre-clinical evaluation of the new veress needle+ mechanism on thiel-embalmed bodies: a controlled crossover study - Experimental research

Background: <br/>Veress needles (VN) are commonly used in establishing pneumoperitoneum in laparoscopic surgery. Previously, a VN with a new safety mechanism ‘VeressPLUS’ needle (VN+) was developed to reduce the amount of overshoot.<br/><br/>Methods: <br/>Eighteen participants (novices, intermediates, and experts) performed in total of 248...

Inflicted head-injury by shaking-trauma in infants: the importance of spatiotemporal variations of the head’s rotation center

Inflicted head injury by shaking trauma (IHI-ST) in infants is a type of abusive head trauma often simulated computationally to investigate causalities between violent shaking and injury. This is commonly done with the head’s rotation center kept fixed over time. However, due to the flexibility of the infant’s neck and the external shaking...