Hall Effect Sensing Workspace Estimation with Non-Permanent Magnetic Needle for Eye Anesthesia Training System via Robotic Experiments

Abstract

Ophthalmic anesthesia is an important preparation for eye surgery. The conventional practice is performed blind in a cadaver under the supervision of an experienced surgeon. This paper introduces a needle tip tracking system for ophthalmic anesthesia training without major modification of an anesthesia needle. The study presents a prototyped system to track a magnetized needle tip using Hall-effect sensor array. The orbital structure model was embedded with Hall-effect sensors after considering the sensing workspace and ophthalmic anesthesia pathway. The extended Kalman filter was used to calculate needle tip position. A commercial robotic manipulator was used to model the characteristics of sensor and accuracy of the developed system. A prototype can detect needle tip position with a root-mean-square deviation around 1.80 mm. As a result, the system is capable of providing needle tip positions for training purposes.