Descrizione del progetto
Tessuti artificiali per la formazione chirurgica
La formazione chirurgica per lo sviluppo della coordinazione occhio-mano, della destrezza e di altre abilità essenziali prevede la pratica su cadaveri e animali. Insieme ai simulatori virtuali, questi mezzi consentono ai chirurghi di affinare le proprie capacità senza i rischi associati all’esecuzione di interventi su pazienti reali. Tuttavia, considerati la disponibilità limitata e i costi elevati associati a questo tipo di formazione, nasce l’esigenza di metodi alternativi. Il progetto ALPHA-STEM, finanziato dal programma di azioni Marie Skłodowska-Curie, intende sviluppare modelli sintetici artificiali, noti come fantocci, che riproducano le strutture anatomiche e forniscano un riscontro tattile accurato per le attività chirurgiche. I ricercatori progetteranno, produrranno e collauderanno alcuni materiali avanzati per imitare vari organi e tessuti umani. ALPHA-STEM introdurrà un cambiamento radicale nella formazione chirurgica e nella preparazione alle operazioni reali.
Obiettivo
Research has shown that the success rate in many types of surgeries is strictly related to the experience of the surgeon. However, early in their career, trainees are not given the opportunity to operate on a sufficient number of patients nor to perform an exhaustive mix of procedures. The scenario has been further worsened by the reduction of assisted training hours in Europe (since 2009) and US (since 2011). Training and technical tasks are usually practised on cadavers, animals or using virtual simulators. However, all these alternatives present difficulties: limited availability, expensive handling and preservation processes (cadaveric training), nonhuman anatomical structures (animal training), costly set-up, and doubtful skills transfer to the real operating theatre (virtual simulators). A potential solution is to promote the use of artificial synthetic models, also known as phantoms. Phantoms are reproduction of human parts and organs that allow the trainee to practice positioning of the anatomical structures as well as hand coordination. Unfortunately, they lack of reliable tactile feedback (e.g. palpation) and real tissue deformation patterns which critically reduce the fidelity of the surgical training.
The main objective of this project is to overcome the present limitations by developing phantoms capable of providing detailed anatomical structures along with an accurate tactile response when performing surgical tasks such as cutting, indention and suturing. The proposed investigation is aimed at designing, making and testing synthetic advanced materials tailored to reproduce the mechanical response of different human organs and tissues (lung, brain, liver, skin, cartilage, etc.). Direct comparisons with experimental data on organic tissues and feedback from a number of experienced surgeons will be used to validate the effectiveness of the proposed solutions during this research journey towards safer surgeries.
Campo scientifico
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
MSCA-IF-GF - Global FellowshipsCoordinatore
20133 Milano
Italia