Browse Technologies

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Vanderbilt researchers have developed a new system to detect the position, orientation, and pressure exerted on surrounding tissues of a wireless capsule endoscopy device.  Magnetic coupling is one of the few physical phenomena capable of transmitting actuation forces across a physical barrier.  Magnetic manipulation has the potential to make surgery less invasive, by allowing untethered miniature devices to enter the body through natural orifices or tiny incisions, and then maneuver with minimal disruption to healthy tissue.  In order to accomplish this goal, the pose (position and orientation) of the medical device must be available in real time.

Inventors at Vanderbilt University have developed a robotic platform capable of guaranteeing a degree of agility, mechanical stability, power, reliability, comparable to a standard robotic platform for laparoscopic surgery, but characterized by a much lower invasiveness.

Heart valve disease is the 3rd most prevalent source of cardiovascular disease, leading to approximately 20,000 deaths per year in the U.S. alone. Moreover, there are an estimated 41,000 mitral valve procedures performed in the U.S. each year. The only effective, long-term treatment for mitral valve disease is open-chest valve replacement surgery, which is highly undesirable for elderly patients. Thus, there is a pressing need to develop novel percutaneous strategies for treatment that will reduce the number of open-chest surgeries. David Merryman and colleagues have developed a new, combined catheter that uses cryo temperatures to adhere to moving mitral valve leaflets and radiofrequency ablation to alter the compliance of the leaflet tissue to prevent prolapse and regurgitation.

A Vanderbilt team led by anesthesiologist Dr. Rajnish Gupta has developed a rapidly adjustable flexible positioning arm that can precisely position the ultrasound probe in such a way that it can be adjusted and fine-tuned with the flip of a switch. Upon fixing the probe in position, both of the clinician's hands are free to perform ultrasound guided procedures without the need for a second person to hold the probe.