3D printers for surgical practice

Rath, Subha Narayan and Sankar, Sharanya (2017) 3D printers for surgical practice. 3D Printing in Medicine. pp. 139-154. ISSN 2365-6271

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Abstract

Surgical operations are challenging for newly recruited residents and experienced surgeons alike, as they involve unexpected findings in a surgical field, timely decisions, and unpredictable outcomes. In addition, they pose problems for experienced surgeons, who are dealing with congenital anomalies or complicated cancer cases, where the inter-anatomical relationships might not be as per traditional knowledge. Although a number of imaging modalities exist to accurately predict the anatomy in 3D, surgeons find it difficult to grasp and plan the details because of the limitations of 3D anatomy visualization and inter-tissue relationships on a 2D screen. 3D printing technology comes to aid in these circumstances. Surgeons could use the technology for a number of applications, including creation of patient specific pathological models for surgical planning, designing of customized prostheses, planning for surgical guide templates, and fabrication of accurate low-cost anatomical models as teaching aids. In addition, the patients as customers of medical therapy can clearly understand the complexity of surgery and the goals of surgical planning in complicated surgeries using these 3D models. Surgeons can clearly communicate with them about their condition through these palpable models. In summary, 3D printing technology could play an important role for both patient satisfaction and surgeons’ ability to provide better surgical care

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