An Innovative Approach for Assessing Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis through the Use of a Stewart Platform and Stereo Vision Technology

Medical robots have been applied to a variety of areas and have great potential to radically change the mode of surgical operations and conventional medical-care as part of a more information-intensive environment that exploits the complementary strengths of computer-based technology. Scoliosis is an unnatural curvature or deformity of the spine with lateral deviations from the normally vertical spinal outline. As one of the most common occurrence, if left undetected and untreated, adolescent idiopathic scoliosis can impact the quality of life during the period of rapid body growth, leading to a disturbed self-image, potential back pain, and pulmonary and cardiac problems in later life. This paper develops an innovative and integrative system consisting of a Stewart Platform, which is a type of parallel kinematic motion manipulator, to assist scoliosis measurement. Using this system, a subject’s bending posture can be obtained with high repeatability in a series of pre-defined angles, e.g., 0°, 30°, 45°, and 90°. For each posture, images of the subject’s back can be captured using stereo cameras and analyzed quantitatively to determine the presence and severity of scoliosis. Furthermore, all the data are stored in the database for further monitoring and assessment. By introducing information-driven assessment tools, this research helps doctors and surgeons to treat individual patients with greater safety, improved efficacy, and reduced morbidity in the measurement of scoliosis.