Development and Design of an Interface for Laparoscopic Instruments for Hybrid Surgery

Abstract

Robot assisted surgery has established itself as alternative work process for performing laparoscopic procedures. During surgery, the surgeon sits at a console from which the laparoscopic robotic instruments are controlled. Prior to surgery, a decision is already made as to whether the surgery will be performed as a standard laparoscopic procedure or as a robotassisted procedure. The intention of this thesis is to explore possibilities to combine robotic and traditional laparoscopic surgery. For this purpose a mechanical interface is developed that integrates a standard laparoscopic instrument to a robotic setup with the MiroSurge at the German Center for Aerospace. The robot will form an intelligent trocar which, together with the developed adapter, can guide and stabilize the movement of the instrument. The mechanical extension will create a linear movement along the shaft axis while the required space should be kept as small as necessary. Standard laparoscopic instruments can be fixated in the coupling and be either moved by hand or by external control. In order to fully integrate a change from a hands-on approach to a telemanipulated robot assisted procedure, an externally motorized attachment to the instrument is added to fully enable telemanipulated control.