Alexander Grif, a Junior Researcher at the Faculty of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science, NSTU NETI, became the winner of the international exhibition "Archimedes – 2020". The jury highly appreciated the program that simulates individual skull implants for people with traumatic brain injuries (TBI). The software allows refusing standard plates, it can be used to create personal implants with individual geometry and strength, and this significantly reduces the cost of the surgery since less expensive titanium is required for the implant. After the technology is implemented, the implant can be simply printed on a 3D metal printer, and not manually "adjusted" for the patient. The new development will reduce the surgery time and the risk of complications.
The young scientist received a bronze medal at the Moscow International Inventions and Innovation Technology Salon "Archimedes – 2020". The exhibition was held in online format; the results of the work were summed up this week. The jury highly appreciated the program that simulates individual skull implants for people with traumatic brain injuries (TBI), which was developed by a Junior Researcher of NSTU NETI.
Alexander Grif developed a computer program creating individual 3D implants for craniocerebral surgery. Previously, patients with craniocerebral trauma had impressive titanium parts installed during surgery, with doctors adjusting them manually according to the affected region configuration. The disadvantages of this technology are that it takes too much time to fit the implant during the surgery, and there is also a large amount of the expensive titanium "excess" that is cut off when the standard workpiece is individually adjusted. The cost of one gram of titanium for an implant is 1500 rubles, and the part loses up to 10 grams during preparation.
"One day, specialists from Novosibirsk Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics (NRITO) came to our faculty and offered to develop a program for individual implants which could be used not only by an engineer, but also by any doctor. I was interested in this project, and by the end of 2016, the "CranioCAD"program was created and tested. Based on the testing results, NRITO doctors expressed their wishes for adding functionality, which I took into account at finalizing the software. This May, the doctors entrusted me with real patients to make the system more automated, or, in other words, intelligent," says Alexander Grif.
One of the important factors for creating a new software platform is the problem faced by patients after the so-called "titanium mesh" surgery. In such surgery, the "mesh" is placed inside the skull (between the brain and the skull), so patients have a lifetime depression on the head after healing. Surgeons insert modern personalized implants into the skull like a Lego puzzle. This allows maintaining the aesthetic shape of the head after neurosurgical operations on the skull.
Based on the testing results of the platform, the program reduced the weight of the first implant model by about 10% and saved about 7 thousand rubles. The implant weight is reduced by optimizing material costs, since 3D printing uses only as much metal as necessary. Now typical plates are used during craniocerebral surgery; they have to be adjusted to the skull by grinding. The software builds an individual model for each patient according to the shape, thickness of the implant and the size of the holes, which are necessary during the material and the head tissues coalescence. The initial software tests held in NRITO have showed that the implants fit well to the skull.
In addition to saving material, the program eliminates the expensive work of an engineer who adjusts the plate to the shape of the skull. The engineer work is now estimated at 10-20 thousand rubles per model. Additionally, the use of the "CranioCAD" software in medicine will reduce the costs of creating implants by approximately 10-15% according to preliminary calculations.
The program not only solves problems related to individual features of the skull structure, but also implements complex functionality in a simple interface. The surgeon can create a 3D model of the implant in one click by uploading CT scan data to the program. The program will create a model of an individual implant in 15 minutes, after which an industrial 3D printer will quickly print it out of titanium. Now it can take from several hours to several days to make the plate manually. Such a delay in the surgery is undesirable, and even dangerous for a patient with TBI.
Though there are foreign analogues of the "CranioCAD" program, their disadvantage is that only a person with special training can work with these programs, while any doctor with basic computer skills can easily master the Novosibirsk program.
Reference
Today, traumatic brain injury (TBI) is one of the most important health problems in the country and around the world. According to the National Public Health Institute, the annual damage from TBI is estimated at 500 billion rubles. In Russia, about 600 thousand people receive TBI every year; 50,000 of them die, and another 50,000 become disabled.
The project of the software platform "CranioCAD "is supported by the Foundation for Assistance to Small Innovative Enterprises, the program" UMNIK" which is focused on scientific and technical projects of young researchers. The Foundation for Assistance to Small Innovative Enterprises is a state non-profit organization established by decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 65 of February 3, 1994. It is one of the three state scientific foundations.
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