Abstract
In this paper, a novel method for automatic identification of a surgical operation and on-line recognition of the singularity of the identified surgical operation is proposed. Suturing is divided into six operations. The features of the operation are extracted from the measurements of the movement of the forceps, and then, on the basis of the threshold criteria for the six operations, a surgical operation is identified as one of the six operations. Next, the features of any singularity of operation are extracted from operator's surface electromyogram signals, and the identified surgical operation is classified as either normal or singular using a self-organizing map. Using the built laparoscopic-surgery simulator with two forceps, the identification of each surgical operation and the distinction of the singularity of the identified surgical operation were carried out for a specific surgical operation, namely, insertion of a needle during suturing. Each surgical operation in suturing could be identified with more than 80% accuracy, and the singularity of the surgical operation of insertion could be distinguished with approximately 80% accuracy on an average. The experimental results showed the effectiveness of the proposed method.
