Flinders Medical Devices and Technologies

Professor Karen Reynolds, Flinders University

Many medical procedures rely on correct manipulation of both medical and surgical tools and anatomical structures. Flinders Medical Devices and Technologies is developing realistic medical and surgical simulations using computing (virtual reality) technologies. Haptics (or the sense of touch) is an important element of these simulations.

Haptics is a emerging area, and the more researchers do, the more the realisation emerges that it really is very early days in this field. Using eResearch SA's haptics workbench, the team at Flinders have been continuing to develop real-time applications, concentrating on the physics of simulations (methods for collision detection, deformation and so on) which is fundamental to the quality of the haptics.

The team is currently working on an endotracheal intubation simulator to teach doctors how to perform effective airway management. The haptics workbench uses a mirror to co-locate the virtual environment with the haptic environment. This is important in medical simulation because the user's hand needs to be where they see it in the scene.