Endoscopy system for length measurement by manual pointing with an electromagnetic tracking sensor

Abstract

We propose a practical and simple measurement function of three dimensional (3D) length for endoscopy based on triangulation
using manually pointed correspondences. This system is a novel combination of conventional methods. 3D length information
is useful for many medical purposes and the burden of manual procedures can be reduced by focusing on length. We employed
a novel combination for length measurement, that is, a monocular endoscope with an electromagnetic tracking sensor. The proposed
method can measure the length without any equipment for light projection and changing the current procedure of endoscopy.
Our method is made more robust and reliable than the automatic correspondence techniques through the best use of the expertise
of endoscopists. We developed a prototype system and evaluated its accuracy. From experimental results, we showed that the
proposed method can measure the 3D length of static objects accurately as long as the measurement geometry is suitable.

Keywordsendoscopy-endoscope-length measurement-manual pointing-electromagnetic tracking sensor-triangulation