Clinical Trial: Forces During Skull Base Surgery
Study Status: Completed
Recruit Status: Completed
Study Type: Observational
Official Title: Measuring Forces Applied During Skull Base Surgery
Brief Summary: This study is designed to measure forces applied using standard surgical instruments at the skull base during resection of skull base lesions. This data will be useful for optimizing an active canula robot for assisting in skull base surgery. We hypothesize that through measurement of forces generated during routine endoscopic skull base surgery we will be able to optimize the canulas of an active canula robot for skull base surgery.
Detailed Summary:
At some time in their lives, 1 in 5 people will have a pituitary tumor, and 1 in 600 of these will have the tumor grow large enough (>1 cm in diameter) that surgical resection is required. Traditionally, surgery to remove pituitary tumors or other tumors at the skull base requires transcranial or transfacial access. In these approaches, large traumatic, often disfiguring, openings must be created in the patient's forehead or cheek. Endonasal skull base surgery reduces invasiveness resulting in less trauma, fewer complications, and shorter surgical time. However, despite the compelling advantages for the patient, only a small percentage of skull base surgeries are done endonasally. While exact statistics are not available, the current best estimate in the literature is that less than 50% and most likely less than 20% of these tumors are addressed by endonasal surgery.
The endonasal approach is underemployed despite its demonstrated benefits to the patient because existing surgical instruments have limited dexterity and approach angles, and simultaneously manipulating several of them through a nostril while performing complex surgical procedures is so technically challenging that only a small number of expert surgeons can accomplish it. Even for these experts, mortality rates are non-negligible (0.9%), and there remain contraindications to the endonasal approach, including occlusion of the surgical site by delicate and critical neurovascular structures (e.g. carotid arteries, optic nerves), inability to fully reconstruct the dura due to lack of surgical tool dexterity, and long surgical duration. All of these contraindications are directly related to limitations in instrument dexterity and visualization, which motivates the development of a robotic system for endonasal skull base surgery. Such a robot can potentially increase surgical dexterity and reduce the technical c
Sponsor: Vanderbilt University
Current Primary Outcome: 6-axis force and torque data from routine endoscopic transnasal skull base surgery [ Time Frame: 12 months ]
Original Primary Outcome: Same as current
Current Secondary Outcome: Percent tumor removal in skull and cadaver studies [ Time Frame: 12 months ]
Original Secondary Outcome: Same as current
Information By: Vanderbilt University
Dates:
Date Received: October 8, 2012
Date Started: October 2012
Date Completion:
Last Updated: December 8, 2014
Last Verified: December 2014