Design and development of a feedback mechanism and approach for patient-instrument stabilization during office-based medical procedures

This paper presents the design, development and application results of a feedback mechanism for general patient-instrument stabilization, though illustrated more specifically for an office-based ear surgical procedure in the paper. It serves a twofold objective. First, it characterizes the head movement patterns in different positions with respect to space and time which serves as the specifications for an overall stabilization strategy and the design of a realistic head movement simulator. Secondly, it is used as a feedback mechanism to engage patients to jointly achieve patient-instrument stabilization while distracting them from the procedure on hand. At the core of the development is the iNEMO, an integrated IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) MEMS (Micro Electromechanical Systems) module, mounted on the patient´s head. Signal processing and sensor fusion algorithms converts the transducer data into the roll, pitch and yaw of the head movements which are used for analysis and control purposes. With such a feedback mechanism, the experiment results show that patients can maintain a desired head orientation within a very tight threshold. Other applications of such a device and approach will be also highlighted.