Augmented Reality Visualisation Concepts to Support Intraoperative Distance Estimation

The estimation of distances and spatial relations between surgical instruments and surrounding anatomical structures is a challenging task for clinicians in image-guided surgery. Using augmented reality (AR), navigation aids can be displayed directly at the intervention site to support the assessment of distances and reduce the risk of damage to healthy tissue. To this end, four distance-encoding visualisation concepts were developed using a head-mounted optical see-through AR setup and evaluated by conducting a comparison study. Results suggest the general advantage of the proposed methods compared to a blank visualisation providing no additional information. Using a Distance Sensor concept signalising the proximity of nearby structures resulted in the least time the instrument was located below 5mm to surrounding risk structures and yielded the least amount of collisions with them.