I-Corps: On-line Monitoring of a Tissue Welding Process

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The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is that the proposed technology provides a much-needed solution to the current problems in electrosurgery that is widely used in many medical specialties such as neurological surgery. Electrosurgery is fast and requires short post-surgery recovery time; however, major problems such as collateral nerve damage and seal failure still exist, sometimes with fatal consequences. The proposed technology helps eliminate those problems by monitoring the electrosurgical process with an acoustic signal. It will enable an assistive device for surgeons to make precise decisions that will ensure the surgical quality. It will reduce surgeon fatigue, time in the operating room, and healthcare cost, while improving the overall patient experience. This project allows extensive customer discovery and market analysis, from which commercial products will be developed to satisfy the needs of patients, surgeons, and hospitals. With the projected $5.17B global market for electrosurgical equipment by 2021, the proposed technology will have a significant commercial potential. The monitoring methodology applied to this project brings advances to the field of precision surgery with engineering principles. This I-Corps project focuses on developing a real-time acoustic signal monitoring system for quality assurance of the electrosurgical process. First, sound signals captured during the surgery is correlated to the water boiling and protein denaturing process in heated tissue. Then, a decision-making algorithm is developed based on the signal strength and number of bubble bursting events. Previous research on the electrosurgical process has provided fundamental understanding and suggested that the acoustic monitoring method is dramatically better than existing ones. In the previous study, experiments was conducted with ex-vivo porcine tissue and the feasibility of the proposed technology using a low-profile sensor was demonstrated. This I-Corps award will provide opportunities to conduct customer interviews for technology refinement. A set of functional requirements for product development will be identified to support commercialization of the proposed technology.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.