Basic Research for the Patient-Specific Surgery Support System—An Identification Algorithm of the Mesentery Using 3D Medical Images

Abstract

Currently, laparoscopic surgery has widely been accepted as a major option for the treatment of abdominal diseases such as gallbladder stone, gastric cancer, and colon cancer. Preoperative anatomical assessment is crucial for laparoscopic surgery. Anatomically, the digestive tract is covered with a bilayered thin-membranous tissue called ‘mesentery’ and the arteries and veins courses within the mesentery. Although preoperative anatomical information of mesentery will add clinical information, current imaging modalities cannot visualize mesentery because of its limits of spatial resolution of medical imaging. In this study, combining the anatomical features of the mesentery and data such as an interrelation between the mesentery and the surrounding organs obtained with empirical laws of physicians, we propose technology to reproduce geometrically a shape of the mesentery, of which describing is impossible from 3D medical images . Rendering and visualizing the structure of mesentery from the data of preoperative medical images is expected in clinical medicine.