Image-guided Breast Biopsy of MRI-visible Lesions with a Hand-mounted Motorised Needle Steering Tool

TL;DR

This paper presents a robotic, image-guided breast biopsy system that improves targeting accuracy for MRI-visible lesions by combining real-time optical tracking, image fusion, and a motorized needle steering device, validated through phantom experiments.

Contribution

It introduces a novel hand-mounted, motorized needle steering tool with software architecture for MRI-guided breast biopsies, enhancing precision over manual methods.

Findings

Targeting radius down to 2.3 mm in phantom experiments

Robotic system effectively accounts for breast deformations

Potential to improve clinical biopsy accuracy

Abstract

A biopsy is the only diagnostic procedure for accurate histological confirmation of breast cancer. When sonographic placement is not feasible, a Magnetic Resonance Imaging(MRI)-guided biopsy is often preferred. The lack of real-time imaging information and the deformations of the breast make it challenging to bring the needle precisely towards the tumour detected in pre-interventional Magnetic Resonance (MR) images. The current manual MRI-guided biopsy workflow is inaccurate and would benefit from a technique that allows real-time tracking and localisation of the tumour lesion during needle insertion. This paper proposes a robotic setup and software architecture to assist the radiologist in targeting MR-detected suspicious tumours. The approach benefits from image fusion of preoperative images with intraoperative optical tracking of markers attached to the patient's skin. A hand-mounted biopsy device has been constructed with an actuated needle base to drive the tip toward the desired direction. The steering commands may be provided both by user input and by computer guidance. The workflow is validated through phantom experiments. On average, the suspicious breast lesion is targeted with a radius down to 2.3 mm. The results suggest that robotic systems taking into account breast deformations have the potentials to tackle this clinical challenge.