This patent application is the National Stage of International Application No. PCT/BE2005/000100 filed Jun. 27, 2005, that claims the benefit of Great Britain Application No. 0414277.4 filed Jun. 25, 2004.
The present invention relates to methods for assessing the shape of the skull and soft tissues and for determining a treatment plan for maxillofacial surgery and more particularly for orthognatic surgery and devices used in such surgery or in the preparation thereof.
In maxillofacial surgery, the skull and dentition is surgically remodelled or restored. This surgical discipline encompasses surgical interventions of repair, in particular, of a mis-positioning of the jaws with respect to one another, called orthognatic surgery. Typically, orthognatic surgery involves osteotomies of the maxilla and/or mandible to reposition these bone fragments correctly with respect to the rest of the skull and to create a good occlusion. Osteotomies are surgical operations whereby a bone is cut to shorten, lengthen or change its alignments. With ‘occlusion’ is meant the manner in which the teeth from upper and lower arches come together when the mouth is closed.
The preparation of such a surgical intervention requires implementing orthodontic and radiographic techniques.
Orthodontic Techniques
A casting of the patient's mandibular and maxillary dentition is made. These castings, generally made of plaster, are then mounted in an articulator representing the tempero-mandibular joints and jaw members. The castings are used to simulate the relative displacement that has to be applied to the jaws to create a good occlusion. To enable the surgeon to respect the simulated relative positions, a splint, i.e. a plate comprising on each of its surfaces tooth-prints of the two castings, is made. The splint is used to maintain the casting or the jaws in relative positions where the teeth are in occlusion.
Since the surgical intervention generally includes osteotomies of both jaws, two splints are generally made from the dental castings, in addition to a so-called initial splint linking the two jaws in their occlusion position before the intervention.
A so-called intermediary splint determines the foreseeable displacement of the maxilla with respect to the mandible, when the mandible is in its original (preoperative) position. This splint enables the surgeon to place the maxilla back on the skull in the desired definitive position before intervening on the mandible. A so-called definitive splint determines the occlusion objective to be surgically achieved and is thus used to correctly position the mandible on the skull by setting the position of the mandible with respect to the previously replaced maxilla.
Radiographic Techniques
The preparation of the surgical operation also uses X-ray radiographs of the patient. Typically a lateral radiograph (cephalogram) is performed. Sometimes a frontal X-ray radiograph and other radiography with different views are performed. These radiographs enable, in particular, performing an approximate simulation of the operative action.
The simulation is performed manually from a tracing paper placed on the radiography. For example, landmarks are indicated and the contours of the mandible are drawn. The tracing paper is then moved to approximately reproduce thereon the desired post-operative occlusion, after which the maxillary contours are drawn. The maxillo-mandibular assembly drawn on the tracing paper is then moved in one block while respecting cephalometric standards, labial ratios, as well as other criteria known for this type of intervention. The direction and amplitude of the jaw displacements are thus radiographically and approximately defined. The results of this simulation are compared and adjusted according to the relative motion of the mandible and of the maxilla envisaged by means of the splints.
The actual simulation of an orthognatic surgical intervention is thus performed essentially manually. Further, this simulation is only done in two dimensions based on a plane profile view of the skull.
The current generation of CT-scanners provide detailed 3D information of the patient's anatomy. Based on this data, 3D surface reconstructions of the bone and the skin surface are possible. Bone fragments can be isolated, and moved with respect to each other. This could provide a suitable basis for a computer assisted orthognatic surgery planning system. However, the currently available 3D surface representations algorithms do not provide a suitable framework comprising anatomically relevant references, which allow the clinician to easily and reliably reposition a bone fragment in the virtual 3D environment. A second problem is associated with the use of 3D surface representations derived from CT-scans of patients having amalgam dental fillings. Teeth amalgam fillings create artefacts that appear as streaks on the CT images. Using these CT images as such, it is impossible to plot on a three-dimensional view the exact position of the teeth to obtain the bite.
Patent document WO03/028577-A2 discloses an apparatus and method for fabricating orthognatic surgical splints. It also relates to a method for creating a computerised composite skull model suitable for diagnosis and treatment planning. In said method a 3D CT model of the patient's bone structure and a digital dental computer model of the patient's dentition are generated, both comprising a same set of fiduciary markers.
The present invention aims to provide a method for performing a cephalometric and/or anthropometric analysis. In a second object it aims to provide a method for deriving a treatment plan for orthognatic surgery, comprising said analysis method. In a further object it aims to provide devices suitable therefor.
The present invention relates to a method for performing a cephalometric and/or anthropometric analysis comprising the steps of:
Preferably the medical image modality is magnetic resonance imaging or computer tomography. The 3D surface model advantageously represents a bone structure surface and/or a soft tissue envelope.
In a preferred embodiment the method further comprises the step of visualising said generated at least one 2D cephalogram together with the 3D surface model in a virtual scene.
Advantageously the method further comprises the determining of a reference frame from anatomical reference points on the person's head.
Preferably in a further step a report of the cephalometric analysis is generated.
In another embodiment the method comprises the further step of providing 2D or 3D photographs, from which a textured 3D skin surface is derived.
The analysis typically comprises the determination of linear distances between two landmarks, the distance of a landmark to a reference plane, the distance between landmarks projected on a plane, angles between landmarks or planes, proportions computed between these measurements or the distance between two points along a surface and parallel to a plane.
In yet a further embodiment the method comprises the steps of acquiring a 3D scan of the person's head, while the person is wearing a 3D splint. Also a 3D scan of casts of said person's upper and lower jaw is then preferably acquired. Next the 3D scan of said person's head, while wearing the 3D splint, and the 3D scan of casts of upper and lower jaw are fused, based on features of the 3D splint. Advantageously data from the 3D scan of the person wearing said 3D splint is subsequently used for generating the 3D surface model.
In a second object the invention relates to a method for deriving planning information for repositioning a bone fragment, comprising the steps of:
In an advantageous embodiment the virtual positions result from a translation and/or rotation of the bone fragment.
In another object the invention relates to a device for cephalometric and/or anthropometric analysis, comprising
In a further object the invention relates to a 3D splint for use in a method as previously described. The 3D splint comprises a U-shaped part arranged for fitting the upper and lower dental arches and is provided with an extra-oral or intra-oral extension on the U-shaped part.
In a last object the invention relates to a program, executable on a programmable device containing instructions, which when executed, perform the method as previously described.
In order to perform an adequate 3D cephalometric analysis of bone tissue and/or soft tissues, the ability to indicate the relevant points on the 3D structures alone does not suffice. Points required for adequate 3D cephalometric tracing that are not well defined on the 3D structure are available on a 2D representation and vice-versa. The present invention describes a computerised system that solves this problem.
The present invention provides a method to redefine the framework of a 3D surface representation into an anatomically relevant framework. The anatomically relevant framework allows a clinician to perform an accurate cephalometric and/or anthropometric analysis in an intuitive manner. Moreover, a 3D surface representation comprising an anatomically relevant framework has the advantage that it allows the virtual repositioning of bone fragments in relation to anatomically relevant landmarks, making it particularly suited for the planning of surgical interventions. The flowchart shown in
In medical imaging, a modality is any of the various types of equipment or probes used to acquire images of the body. Radiography, computer tomography, ultrasonography and magnetic resonance imaging are examples for modalities in the present context.
A method and device to perform a 3D cephalometric and/or anthropometric analysis is disclosed allowing a preoperative assessment of a patient's anatomy. The device comprises a computerised system, visualising image volumes (e.g. CT-image volumes) and surface models extracted from it, together with 2D projection grey-value images, i.e. virtual X-ray images geometrically linked with the CT-image and computed from it. The combined information provides a means for effectively and accurately assessing the 3D anatomy of the patient's skull and soft tissue surface. The technology fuses classical 2D cephalometric tracings with 3D bone surface visualisation. The surface model can be generated using the CT data, as described in the paper ‘Marching Cubes: a High Resolution 3D Surface Construction Algorithm’ by W. E. Lorensen, H. E. Cline (ACM Computer Graphics (ACM SIGGRAPH '87 Proceedings), vol. 21, no. 4, pp. 163-169, July 1987). The virtual X-ray images (cephalograms) can be obtained as described in ‘Display of surfaces from volume data’, Levoy M., IEEE Comput. Graph. Appl. 8,3 (May 1988), pp. 29-37.
A 3D scan of the patient is the input to the system. The image volume is composed of so-called ‘voxels’, i.e. volume elements that each hold one value (e.g. a greyvalue). The box-shaped voxels compose a complete image volume when arranged in a three-dimensional array. Based on this image volume, a 3D surface of the bone structure and/or the soft tissue envelope is constructed. If required, it is possible to add the natural complexion (the natural tone and texture of the skin) of the face to the skin surface generated from CT-data, by adding the colour information of the face. To achieve this, a textured 3D skin surface, acquired e.g. by 3D photography or laser scanning, can be added and registered to the CT-data (see flowchart in
In an initial step the clinician defines or selects the type of analysis. A cephalometric analysis performs measurements at the level of the patient's skull. An anthropometric analysis performs measurements at the level of the patient's skin. The present invention allows defining various cephalometric and anthropometric analyses or even a combination of both. The type of analysis determines the anatomical landmarks that should be indicated by the clinician and the measurements that are computed.
Before indicating these landmarks the clinician has virtually positioned the patient to create a lateral cephalogram (see
The anatomical reference frame is a coordinate system attached to anatomical reference points. This reference frame consists of a horizontal, median and vertical plane (
In a particular embodiment, the system constructs such anatomical relevant reference frame after the clinician has indicated following anatomical landmarks:
In a next step anatomical landmarks of the analysis are indicated. Landmarks are characteristic anatomical points on hard tissues or soft tissues. The landmarks can be indicated on the surface model or on the 2D cephalogram (see
Finally, the measurements (distances or angles) of the analysis are computed and preferably a report is generated. The position of the landmarks can be adjusted. Possible measurements comprise:
Several types of cephalometric analyses can be defined. In the set-up of a specific type of cephalometric analysis preferably following elements are defined:
In order to prepare efficiently the repositioning of bone fragments the following requirements should be achieved for an orthognatic surgery planning system:
In the prior art solutions most clinicians perform a planning using 2D cephalograms in combination with dental castings. However, as a 2D cephalogram is a projection image, 3D information is lost, while dental casts only give 3D information on a very limited area of the head and provide no information on the soft tissue.
When preparing a bone fragment repositioning, useful additional information can be obtained using the above-described 3D cephalometric analysis (
To create an easy way of working, the user can predefine in the computerised orthognatic surgery planning system various types of surgery, such as maxillary advancement, mandibular advancement, mandibular widening, etc. When he chooses a type of surgery, a user interface asking to perform several tasks is popped up. At the end, the surgeon can enter specific surgical parameters and the bone fragments are moved accordingly (
Amalgam dental fillings can corrupt CT-images at the level of the teeth. This renders accurate visualisation of the occlusion very difficult. Moreover, to clearly inspect the occlusion, the details of the teeth are very important. To image the details of teeth, a very high resolution CT-scan is required, and in consequence a high X-ray exposure of the patient. However, it should be avoided to expose a patient to high X-ray doses.
In order to increase the level of detail at the level of the crown of the teeth, without increasing the CT radiation dose, a 3D-splint (
While wearing this splint, the patient is CT-scanned. Then, plaster casts of the patient's upper and lower jaw with the splint in between (see
After finishing the virtual planning using the 3D cephalometric reference frame with the enhanced imaging of the teeth, the plaster casts are mounted in an articulator. The planning system exports the virtual planning results to the articulator in order to move the plaster casts in the same way as in the virtual planning (see flowchart in
Alternatively, the surgical splints can be digitally designed. A box-shaped or a U-shaped object is introduced in the software and the intersection volume with the plaster cast model is computed, after which the inserted object is removed. This object is then produced. Several available production methods can be applied: e.g. milling, 3D printing, stereolithography, sintering, . . . Using these production methods, the splints are directly produced or otherwise a model is produced from which a splint can be derived manually by routinely used techniques.
Also, the planning results of the maxillofacial surgery planning can be exported to a surgical navigation system, as indicated in the flowchart of
Optionally, the surgeon can also work the other way around. The surgeon performs a (possibly partial) model surgery on the plaster casts. To check this model surgery with the remainder of the skull, the new positions of the models are CT-scanned. This scan is entered in the planning system by means of registration. Based on one or more unaltered parts of the current plaster casts and the original plaster casts, the models are registered by surface matching and the transformation matrices for the bone surface are known.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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0414277.4 | Jun 2004 | GB | national |
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
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PCT/BE2005/000100 | 6/27/2005 | WO | 00 | 12/12/2006 |
Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
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WO2006/000063 | 1/5/2006 | WO | A |
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6081739 | Lemchen | Jun 2000 | A |
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7156655 | Sachdeva et al. | Jan 2007 | B2 |
20040015327 | Sachdeva et al. | Jan 2004 | A1 |
Number | Date | Country |
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WO 03028577 | Apr 2003 | WO |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20070197902 A1 | Aug 2007 | US |