Prosper: image and robot-guided prostate brachytherapy

TL;DR

Prosper integrates 3D ultrasound, MRI registration, and a robotic needle system to improve prostate brachytherapy, enhancing procedure quality and accuracy based on patient data and phantom testing.

Contribution

It introduces a novel combination of imaging and robotic guidance for prostate brachytherapy, improving precision and planning.

Findings

Successful testing of imaging methods on patient data

Robot accuracy validated on deformable phantom

Enhanced procedure quality through integrated imaging and robotics

Abstract

Brachytherapy for localized prostate cancer consists in destroying cancer by introducing iodine radioactive seeds into the gland through hollow needles. The planning of the position of the seeds and their introduction into the prostate is based on intra-operative ultrasound (US) imaging. We propose to optimize the global quality of the procedure by: i) using 3D US; ii) enhancing US data with MRI registration; iii) using a specially designed needle-insertion robot, connected to the imaging data. The imaging methods have been successfully tested on patient data while the robot accuracy has been evaluated on a realistic deformable phantom.