Application Of Rapid Prototyping For Creating Skeletal Model And Surgery Simulation

Objective To develop an accurate and effective way to make skeletal model andsimulate surgery for improving diagnosis and treatment and decreasing surgery faults. Methods The 2 dimensional data were attained with spiral CT high density scanning and processed by computer .The soft tissue data was eliminated and the 3 dimensional skeletal images were created. The 3 dimensional data were processed with reverse engineering to slice the CAD model, and the data were imputed into the rapid prototyping machine and the objective model was created with the way of laminated objective manufactory. The diagnosis was made based on the study of the model, and the surgery was simulated on the model, and performed accordingly. 2 cases of congenital dislocation of hip (1 unilateral, 1 bilateral) and 1 case of coxa vara were performed with this procedure. All got rapid prototyping skeletal model and surgerysimulating before operations.Results 3 cases got accurate 3 dimensional objective models. The osteotomies wereperformed before operation. Compared with conventional procedure, the diagnosis is more accurate, the operation time was shortened, the blood loss was decreased and theinternal fixation was more accurate.Conclusions Rapid prototyping can provide accurate skeletal model, which makes the surgery simulation accurate and reliable. The surgery trauma is minimized and thediagnosis and treatment is improved.