A study of an assisting robot for mandible plastic surgery based on augmented reality

Abstract

Background: Mandible plastic surgery plays an important role in conventional plastic surgery. However, its success depends on the experience of the surgeons. In order to improve the effectiveness of the surgery and release the burden of surgeons, a mandible plastic surgery assisting robot, based on an augmented reality technique, was developed.

Material and methods: Augmented reality assists surgeons to realize positioning. Fuzzy control theory was used for the control of the motor. During the process of bone drilling, both the drill bit position and the force were measured by a force sensor which was used to estimate the position of the drilling procedure.

Results: An animal experiment was performed to verify the effectiveness of the robotic system. The position error was 1.07 ± 0.27 mm and the angle error was 5.59 ± 3.15°. The results show that the system provides a sufficient accuracy with which a precise drilling procedure can be performed. In addition, under the supervision’s feedback of the sensor, an adequate safety level can be achieved for the robotic system.

Conclusion: The system realizes accurate positioning and automatic drilling to solve the problems encountered in the drilling procedure, providing a method for future plastic surgery.

Keywords:

• Mandible plastic surgery
• augmented reality
• fuzzy control
• bone drilling

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.

Funding

This work was supported by The Major Program of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 61190124, 61190120), The project of Science and technology commission of Shanghai municipality (No. 14441900800, 14DZ1941100?14DZ1941103, 13DZ0511000), National Science & Technology pillar program of China (No. 2009BAI71B06), National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (No. 2015AA043203), National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 61311140171), Project of SJTU Medical and Engineering Cross Fund (YJ2013ZD03, YG2012MS54).