Development of a Low-Cost Inspection Arm to Map the Available Workspace Within the Abdominal Cavity

Laparo-Endoscopic Single-Site surgery allows surgical procedures to be carried out with a single incision, resulting in quicker patient recovery, less risk of infection, and less cosmetic damage to the patient. This method of surgical operation can be carried out via laparoscopic tools, or by small in vivo robots controlled by a surgeon. Either way, it is important to understand the available workspace in order to correctly size tools or in vivo robots to the task at hand. Incorrectly sized tools can harm patients and are difficult to use. Furthermore, it is important to know the position of specific organs with respect to fixed reference points, such as laparoscopic ports. To collect this data in vivo, a 5 degree of freedom (DOF) inspection arm was constructed that is compatible with standard laparoscopic ports. Using this arm, preliminary data was collected from an abdominal model at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) mock...