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Apparatus and method for catheter guidance control and imaging

  • US 7,769,427 B2
  • Filed: 07/15/2003
  • Issued: 08/03/2010
  • Est. Priority Date: 07/16/2002
  • Status: Expired due to Fees
First Claim
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1. An apparatus for controlling the movement of a surgical tool to be inserted into the body of a patient, comprising;

  • a controllable magnetic field source having a first cluster of electromagnet poles and a second cluster of electromagnet poles, said first cluster of poles substantially opposed to said second cluster of poles;

    a tool having a distal end responsive to said magnetic field, wherein said distal end comprises a magnetic element positioned longitudinally therein, said magnetic element comprising a proximal pole and a distal pole;

    a servo system that controls said location of said distal end of the tool with said controllable magnetic field source by continuously and automatically altering the magnetic field source without any external input from a user;

    one or more magnetic field sensors configured to sense a current position of said proximal pole and said distal pole of said magnetic element in said distal end of the tool wherein the current position of the magnetic element is determined based on the magnitude of a resultant force vector (B) generated by the controllable magnetic field source and further based on the direction of the force vector B;

    wherein the magnitude of the resultant force vector B is determined from three orthogonal components (Bx, By, Bz) associated with at least six electromagnets wherein the magnitude of the force vector B is given by the equation;


    B=square root(Bx2+By2+Bz2),and wherein the direction of the force vector B is determined with at least three resultant angles between the three orthogonal components with the following equations;


    α

    =(cos

    1
    Bx)/B, β

    =(cos

    1
    By)/B, δ

    =(cos

    1
    Bz)/B;

    an auxiliary device comprising at least one of the group consisting of;

    an x-ray device, an ultrasound device, and a radar device, wherein said auxiliary device is configured to obtain dynamic position data concerning a dynamic position of an organ of a patient corresponding to a desired position of said distal end of the tool;

    a system controller that is configured to process said dynamic position data of said organ obtained by said auxiliary device, and said current position of said proximal pole and said distal pole of said distal end of the tool obtained by said magnetic field sensors to compute a position error between said desired position of said distal end of the tool and said current position of said distal end of the tool, such that said system controller computes said position error to compensate for said dynamic position of said organ, and wherein said system controller is further configured to continuously and automatically alter the magnitude and direction of the controllable magnetic field source using the servo system based on the position error data such that said distal end of the tool continuously and automatically moves substantially in unison with a continuous natural motion of said organ, wherein the controllable magnetic field is altered without any external input from the user; and

    a user control device to provide user inputs to said system controller wherein said system controller provides tactile feedback to the user through said user control device when said position error exceeds a predetermined value while simultaneously compensating for said dynamic position as said distal end of the tool moves substantially in unison with the continuous natural motion of said organ.

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