Autonomous Retrieval and Positioning of Surgical Instruments in Robotized Laparoscopic Surgery using Visual Servoing and Laser Pointers

This paper presents a robotic vision system that automatically retrieves and positions surgical instruments in robotized laparoscopic surgery. The surgical instrument is mounted on the end-effector of a surgical robot which can be controlled by automatic visual feedback. The goal of the automated task is to bring the instrument at a desired location from an unknown or hidden position. To achieve this task, a special instrument-holder is designed with optical fibers and collimators. This instrumentholder projects laser dot patterns onto the organ surface which are seen in the endoscopic images. Then, the instrument is retrieved and centered in the image plane using a visual servoing algorithm. With this system, the surgeon can also specify a desired position for the instrument in the image. Our approach is successfully validated in a real surgical environment by performing experiments on living animals in the surgical training room of IRCAD.