Fluoroscopy-Guided Robotic System for Transforaminal Lumbar Epidural Injections

We present an autonomous robotic spine needle injection system using fluoroscopic image-based navigation. Our system includes patient-specific planning, intra-operative image-based 2D/3D registration and navigation, and automatic robot-guided needle injection. We performed intensive simulation studies to validate the registration accuracy. We achieved a mean spine vertebrae registration error of 0.8 +/- 0.3 mm, 0.9 +/- 0.7 degrees, mean injection device registration error of 0.2 +/- 0.6 mm, 1.2 +/- 1.3 degrees, in translation and rotation, respectively. We then conducted cadaveric studies comparing our system to an experienced clinician's free-hand injections. We achieved a mean needle tip translational error of 5.1 +/- 2.4 mm and needle orientation error of 3.6 +/- 1.9 degrees for robotic injections, compared to 7.6 +/- 2.8 mm and 9.9 +/- 4.7 degrees for clinician's free-hand injections, respectively. During injections, all needle tips were placed within the defined safety zones for this application. The results suggest the feasibility of using our image-guided robotic injection system for spinal orthopedic applications.