JPH0871072A - Manipulator system for operation - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To achieve the enhancement of operability and the shortening of an operating time by providing a parameter variable means capable of arbitrarily changing the control parameter necessary for controlling the operation of an operating manipulator performing at least one of the observation and treatment of the tissue region in a living body. CONSTITUTION: A treatment arm 5 and an observation arm 7 for positioning a treatment appliance 4 and a scope 6 within the celom of a patient are attached to the bed side rails 3 provided on both sides of an operating table 1 in a freely detachable manner. Further, the master arm 8 being the input means of a treating slave manipulator and the head mount display 9 being the input means of an observing slave manipulator are provided. A master slave mode is turned ON/OFF by a foot switch 12 and, for example, a scale ratio as a control parameter is increased by stepping the switch 12a of the foot switch 12 by an operator and decreased by stepping the switch 12b of the foot switch 12.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an operating manipulator system for remotely operating a manipulator inserted in a body cavity of a living body by operating means to perform a surgery such as diagnosis and treatment.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, an endoscopic view has been made in which a body wall such as an abdominal wall is provided with an insertion hole, and an endoscope or a treatment tool is percutaneously inserted into the body cavity through the insertion hole to perform various treatments in the body cavity. Mirror surgery is performed. Such an operation method is widely performed as a minimally invasive operation that does not require a large incision, such as a cholecystectomy operation and an operation of removing and removing a part of the lung.

On the other hand, there is known a manipulator for surgery which carries an endoscope and a treatment tool, operates the endoscope and the treatment tool by remote control, and performs a surgery on behalf of the operator. In such a manipulator for surgery, an insertion section including an endoscope and a treatment tool usually has a multi-joint structure, and each joint section is operated by an actuator to facilitate an approach to a target site in a body cavity. .

By the way, in the above-mentioned endoscopic surgery, it is desirable that an endoscope or a treatment tool inserted into a body cavity through an insertion hole formed in a body wall can operate in a wide range within the body cavity. Such an operation can be realized by using a surgical manipulator provided with an insertion portion having a multi-joint structure having a high degree of freedom. In particular, for example, Japanese Patent Application No. 6-1
Using the medical master-slave manipulator system described in Japanese Patent No. 31810, work can be performed at a desired position in a body cavity and at a desired orientation.

This medical master-slave manipulator system is mainly composed of an observation manipulator and a treatment manipulator on the slave side, and a head mount display and a master arm on the master side. The treatment manipulator operates by following the movement of the master arm operated by the surgeon, and the observation manipulator is operated by the surgeon by mounting the head mount display on the head of the surgeon. Operates following. That is, according to such a medical master-slave manipulator, by performing a master-slave operation of operating the slave-side manipulator having a large degree of freedom of the articulated structure with the master arm and the head mount display,
Endoscopic surgery can be performed as if it were an open surgery.

[0006]

By the way, the operation amount, the operation speed, etc. when operating the master arm, the movement of the head (due to the peculiar movement of the operator, etc.), etc. may vary depending on the operator. Is natural.

However, in the above-mentioned medical master-slave manipulator system, the scale ratio representing the ratio of the operation amount of the slave arm to the operation amount of the master arm and the operation amount of the master arm reacts with the slave arm. Since the control parameters necessary for performing the control operation of the manipulator, such as the sensitivity (width of the dead zone), are constant, the operator makes the desired operation for the slave manipulator (observation and treatment manipulator) in the body. I was forced to do some training in order to carry out.

That is, the operator must operate the slave manipulators (observation and treatment manipulators) as he / she desires while performing the operations according to the functions of the medical master-slave type manipulator system. If you are not familiar with, there is a drawback that the time efficiency during surgery becomes worse. The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and its purpose is to:
An object is to provide a manipulator system for surgery with good operability.

[0009]

In order to solve the above problems, a surgical manipulator system according to the present invention is for operating a surgical manipulator for performing at least one of observation and treatment of a tissue part in a living body, and for operating the surgical manipulator. The operating means, the control means for controlling the operation of the surgical manipulator based on the operation information from the operating means, and the control parameter necessary for performing the control operation of the surgical manipulator can be arbitrarily changed. It is equipped with a parameter changing means.

[0010]

With the above construction, since the control parameter can be changed to a state in which the operator can easily operate, the operability is improved and the operation time can be shortened. Also,
Since no skill is required for the operation, it is possible to avoid harming the patient due to an erroneous operation, and there is also an effect that the safety for the patient can be sufficiently ensured.

[0011]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. First, a first embodiment will be described.
FIG. 2 shows an example of the surgical manipulator system of the present invention. In FIG. 2, 1 is an operating table for observing and treating a patient, and 2 is a patient. Bedside rails 3 are provided on both sides of the operating table 1. The bedside rail 3 includes a treatment tool 4 and a scope 6.
A treatment arm 5 and an observation arm 7 for positioning the patient in the body cavity of the patient are detachably attached. The treatment tool 4 and the scope 6 are inserted into the body cavity through the insertion hole 2a formed in the body wall of the patient 2.

The connection between the treatment arm 5 and the treatment instrument 4 and the connection between the observation arm 7 and the scope 6 are performed by a free joint mechanism 19 which is a joint portion having a plurality of degrees of freedom. This is because the patient moves during the operation, for example, the insertion hole 2a.
This is to prevent an unreasonable force from being applied to the insertion hole 2a even if the position of is displaced.

The treatment arm 5 and the observation arm 7 are
Vertical expansion / contraction operation (direction a in FIG. 2), rotation operation (FIG. 2)
It is configured such that a lateral expansion / contraction operation (b direction shown inside) or a lateral expansion / contraction operation (c direction shown in FIG. 2) can be mechanically performed. In order to realize such movement, an actuator (not shown) is arranged in the arm.
A servo motor used for positioning the robot is used as this actuator.

The insertion portion 4a of the treatment instrument 4 attached to the distal end of the treatment arm 5 and the insertion portion 6a of the scope 6 attached to the distal end of the observation arm 7 have their distal ends shown in FIG. The bending drive can be performed in the directions a and b shown. In such bending drive, servomotors (not shown) provided in the servomotor housing portion 4b of the treatment instrument 4 and the servomotor housing portion 6b of the scope 6 are driven to be inserted and arranged in the insertion portions 4a and 6a. It is carried out by pulling a drawn wire (not shown).

The treatment instrument 4 and the scope 6 can be rotated in the direction c shown in FIG. Such rotation drive is performed by the free joint arm joint portions 4c, 6
This is performed by driving the servomotors 4d and 6d provided in c to operate a rotation mechanism (not shown). In particular, the forceps portion 4e of the treatment instrument 4 is attached to the tip forceps portion 4e.
An opening / closing mechanism for opening / closing e is provided. The opening / closing mechanism drives a servo motor (not shown) provided in the servo motor housing portion 4b to insert a rod or wire member inserted into the insertion portion 4a. It is operated by pushing and pulling.

A combination of the treatment tool 4 and the treatment arm 5 will be referred to as a treatment slave manipulator, and a combination of the scope 6 and the observation arm 7 will be referred to as an observation slave manipulator.

A master arm 8 which is the input means of the treatment slave manipulator and a head mounted display 9 which is the input means of the observation slave manipulator.
(Hereinafter referred to as HMD) are shown in FIG.

The master arm 8 is composed of a plurality of link mechanisms. An encoder (not shown) for position detection is provided on each link constituting the link mechanism.
The movement amount of the master arm 8 can be detected by detecting the operation of each link by this encoder.

An electromagnetic clutch (not shown) is attached to each arm link of the master arm 8 so that the master arm 8 does not operate by its own weight when the operator releases the master arm 8. ing. That is, the operation of the master arm 8 is restricted by the electromagnetic clutch so that it does not move except when necessary. When the treatment slave manipulator is actually moved in the master-slave mode, the operation of the electromagnetic clutch is controlled by the operation of stepping on the foot switch 12. That is, the operation of the master arm 8 can be locked and the locked state can be released by the foot switch 12. Here, the master-slave mode refers to a mode in which the movement of the master arm 8 as an input means can be transmitted to the treatment slave manipulator, that is, a mode in which the treatment slave manipulator can follow the movement of the master arm 8.

Here, the information of the encoder set in the master arm 8 is used as the means for operating the treatment slave manipulator, but without using the master arm 8, for example, a strain gauge or a pressure sensor is used. A device that recognizes spatial position information, such as a three-dimensional joystick or a force sensor, may be used. By using such a device, the configuration becomes simpler than that of the master arm 8.

On the other hand, the HMD 9 is equipped with a display (not shown) for displaying an image observed by the scope 6. This display is provided so as to be set at the position of the operator's eyes when the HMD 9 is mounted on the operator's head. Further, the HMD 9 is configured so that the image captured by the tip of the scope 6 can always be observed by the display regardless of how the operator's head moves. According to the HMD 9 having such a configuration, it is not necessary for the operator to perform a troublesome operation such as shifting the line of sight to the TV monitor installed in the operating room during the treatment, which improves the operability. Further, since the image of the affected area can always be clearly observed without removing the line of sight from the affected area, safe surgery can be performed.

The spatial amount of movement of the operator's head is detected by the magnetic sensor 10. The magnetic sensor 10 includes a magnetic sensor source unit 10b that generates a uniform magnetic field and a magnetic sensor sense unit 10a that detects the magnetic field from the magnetic sensor source unit 10b. Of these, the magnetic sensor sensing unit 10a is attached to the HMD 9 at substantially the center thereof.

The movement of the surgeon's head is detected by such a magnetic sensor 10. The detection method will be briefly described. One is generated from the magnetic sensor source portion 10b set at a predetermined location other than the HMD 9. Such a magnetic field is detected by the magnetic sensor sense unit 10a, and the information on the change in the magnetic field due to the movement of the head is processed to obtain the spatial absolute movement amount between the source unit 10b and the sense unit 10a and the sense unit 10a. The Euler angle (roll, pitch, yaw), which is the inclination, is obtained, and the amount of movement and the amount of inclination of the operator's head are detected.

Although a magnetic sensor is used as the means for detecting the movement of the head here, the movement of the head may be detected by, for example, an ultrasonic sensor. Also,
The solid-state imaging device C is provided in the area where the movement of the operator's head can be recognized
By placing a CD and performing image processing based on the operation data of the operator's head obtained through this CCD,
The movement of the head may be detected.

Next, the control device 11 for controlling the operations of the treatment slave manipulator and the observation slave manipulator will be described. As shown in FIG. 2, the control device 1
1 comprises several functional modules necessary for operating each of the slave manipulators. That is, in the figure, 11a is a microcontroller that is a higher-level CPU that integrally controls the functional modules of the control device 11. Reference numeral 11e is an up / down counter for holding the operation amount of the encoder provided in the master arm 8. As a matter of course, the up / down counter 11e has input ports for encoders attached to the master arm 8. Further, the up / down counter 11e is, specifically, a counter value set in advance at the time of initial setting (when the power source of the control device 11 is turned on) with respect to the relative movement amount of the master arm 8 from the encoder. It is to increase or decrease.

Reference numeral 11d is a magnetic sensor data interface circuit for detecting information from the magnetic sensor sensing unit 10a attached to the HMD 9. Information on the absolute position of the magnetic sensor 10 and information on the Euler angle are input to the magnetic sensor interface circuit 11d from the magnetic sensor sensing unit 10a.

Reference numeral 11f is a keyboard interface section for receiving information input from the keyboard 13. Reference numeral 11i is a floppy disk drive for storing operation information of the manipulator system in this embodiment on a floppy disk. A floppy disk controller 11h controls the floppy disk drive 11i. The information stored in the floppy disk includes teaching data of the observation / procedure slave manipulator, scale ratio,
Control parameters such as sensitivity are included. Here, an example of storing in a floppy disk is shown, but it goes without saying that a hard disk, a storage medium used in a peripheral device of an information processing device such as a magneto-optical disk, a simple element level EEPROM, or a battery backup A RAM or the like may be used.

Reference numeral 11g is a foot switch interface section for detecting the input information of the foot switch 12. Since this part does not have a dedicated interface IC, the circuit is configured as shown in FIG.

Here, the foot switch interface portion 11g will be described. Now, for example, if the signal line 33a shown in FIG. 3 is HIGH when the foot switch 12a is not stepped on, the signal line 33a is set to L by stepping on the foot switch 12a.
Change to OW. At this time, LOW signal is wired OR
The input to the circuit 31a changes the output of the flip-flop 31b. As a result, a signal is input to the hard interrupt terminal INT of the microcontroller 11a.

In this embodiment, when the power of the control device 11 is turned on, the switch 12a of the foot switch 12 is turned on.
When stepping on for the first time, the INT signal line is set to be HIGH. Then, after that, when the foot switch 12 is stepped once, the INT terminal becomes LOW, and a jump is made to the interrupt routine inside the microcontroller 11a. However, when the master / slave mode is turned on / off depending on the number of times the foot switch 12 is stepped on, the interrupt terminal INT is counted while counting the number of interrupts rather than simply jumping to the interrupt routine. Since it becomes necessary to determine how to perform the master-slave mode operation while detecting the timing of the signal change of (1), such a dedicated determination routine process is required on the microcontroller 11a side. The details of this will be described later.

In this embodiment, when the foot switch 12 is stepped on once, the master-slave mode is started, and when the foot switch 12 is stepped on again, the master-slave mode is released. Therefore, wired OR
A toggle switch mechanism 31 including a circuit 31a and a flip-flop 31b is provided. In addition,
An up / down counter 32 for remembering the number of times the foot switch 12 is stepped is provided so that the parameter can be changed depending on the number of times the foot switch 12 is stepped. For example, when the switch 12a is stepped on, the value of the up / down counter 32 is UP, and when the switch 12b is stepped on, the value of the up / down counter 32 is DOWN. Also,
When the master-slave mode is turned on by the foot switch 12, the electromagnetic clutch attached to the master arm 8 is released, and the surgeon can freely move the master arm 8 for the first time. Although the foot switch 12a is used here for the convenience of the system configuration, for example, even if a switch is provided in the vicinity of the operator grip of the master arm 8 and the master / slave mode is switched on / off by the operator's hand. I do not care.

Further, in FIG. 2, 11b is a servo interface for driving each of the slave side constituent elements such as the treatment arm 5, the observation arm 7, the treatment instrument 4, and the scope 6, which is a servo interface. It has a digital signal processor (hereinafter referred to as DSP) for performing high-speed arithmetic processing. Further, 11c is the DSP 11b.
It is a servo driver for amplifying the signal of the processing result of (1) to the power required to actually drive the motor.

Next, the interface of each functional module will be described. In FIG. 2, 11m shown in the control device 11 is a data bus line. This data bus line 11m is connected to the microcontroller 11a through D
Sending a position command to the SP 11b, reading encoder feedback information from the servo unit on the slave arm side, up / down counter 11e, magnetic sensor movement amount interface 11d, keyboard interface unit 11f, foot switch interface unit 11g,
It is a line for fetching data from each of the floppy disk interface units 11h into the microcontroller 11a.

Reference numeral 11j is an analog command line for sending the control calculation result obtained by the DSP 11b to the servo driver 11c. Reference numeral 11k is a line for supplying a power signal from the servo driver 11c and a servo feedback encoder line. Reference numeral 11u is a data line for exchanging data between the floppy disk drive 11i and the floppy disk drive controller 11h. 11t is an interface between the foot switch 12 and the foot switch interface section 11g. 11s is a data line for communicating between the keyboard 13 and the keyboard interface section 11f.

In the above interface,
Although only the data bus line 11m for transferring data is shown, it goes without saying that an address bus and a control line for selecting each functional module are added. Also, the 11j line and 11k line for driving the servo system of the observation slave manipulator and the treatment slave manipulator only show those of the analog command line.
There is also an encoder feedback signal line to implement the PID control law in 1b.

Next, the data flow in the control device 11 will be described. Basically, in the master-slave mode, the observation slave manipulator or the treatment slave manipulator operates following the operation of the master arm 8 or the HMD 9. The flow of data is basically the same for observation and for treatment, so only the flow of data in the control device 11 in the master-slave mode for treatment will be described here.

First, the information of the encoder provided on the master arm 8 is read by the up / down counter 11e. The up / down counter 11e increases or decreases the movement amount with respect to the data initially set in the up / down counter 11e, so that the absolute movement amount (the movement amount of the master arm 8) can be detected. The data held in the up / down counter 11e is taken into the microcontroller 11a via the data bus 11m every sampling. In the microcontroller 11a, coordinate conversion processing for determining how to operate each axis of the treatment slave manipulator with respect to the movement amount is performed.

Here, in the case of observation, only the inverse coordinate conversion (conversion work for obtaining the joint variable of each link parameter output to each drive unit of the observation slave manipulator from the absolute position and inclination of the magnetic sensor 10) is performed. In the case of treatment, since the master arm 8 is composed of a plurality of links, forward coordinate conversion (coordinate conversion work for obtaining the position / orientation of the tip of the master arm 8 is performed before performing inverse coordinate conversion. ) Becomes necessary. The correspondence between the operation of the master arm 8 and the operation slave manipulator will be described later.

When the coordinate conversion processing is performed and the movement amount to each arm portion of the treatment slave manipulator is calculated, the command value of this movement amount is given to the microcontroller 11a.
From the data bus 11m to the DSP 11b. The processing in the DSP 11b is performed based on a certain control law (for example, a simple algorithm such as PID control is used). The control calculation result obtained by the DSP 11b is output to the servo driver 11c as an analog command value via the analog command line 11j. This analog command value is amplified by the servo driver 11c, and the amplified output is the servo driver 11c.
Is output to the motor of the treatment slave manipulator from the motor drive line 11k. Thereby, the motor arranged in the treatment slave manipulator drives the mechanism on the slave side, and the treatment slave manipulator operates.

Further, particularly when performing the master-slave mode, the ON / OFF of this mode is controlled by the foot switch 1.
However, since the toggle circuit 31 is connected to the hardware interrupt terminal INT of the microcontroller 11a as shown in FIG.
The processing described above is temporarily stopped by the input of the foot switch 12.

Regarding the interrupt, the foot switch 12
Up / down counter 1 other than the part corresponding to
1e or a timer interrupt for sampling the input from the magnetic sensor interface 11d at regular time intervals, and an alarm interrupt for stopping the slave arm when a servo system abnormality occurs.
The interrupt for this alarm is actually a DSP
A dedicated interrupt line is connected from 11b to the microcontroller 11a. In this case, there are some servo system alarm levels (rotation speed error, overcurrent error, feedback encoder error, deviation counter value error, etc.), but whether to continue the master-slave operation depends on the alarm level. Micro controller 1
1a judges. Particularly, in the case of a fatal abnormality, the program is constructed so that the control program is automatically terminated.

Next, the operation of the system having the above configuration will be described. In order to observe and treat a patient using this system, it is first necessary to set up the control device 11. This setup is for keyboard 13
By selecting the command with. These commands are displayed on the screen of the HMD 9. The display menu at the time of setup is as shown in FIG. 7C, for example. In this embodiment, the menu is HM
Although it is displayed on the display of D9, a display means such as a CRT display may be provided on the control device 11 side so that a person other than the operator (for example, a nurse) can set up.

In this system, the parameters stored in the floppy disk are automatically read at the time of setup. Parameters stored on the floppy disk include teaching data, master-slave scale ratio, and sensitivity. Here, in particular, the master-slave scale ratio and the sensitivity will be described.

The master-slave scale ratio determines how much the operation amount of the slave arm should be relative to the operation amount of the master arm. For example, regarding the master-slave operation of the treatment instrument, if the master-slave scale ratio is 1, the movement amount of the master (arm) 8 is 10 mm, and the movement amount of the slave (treatment) arm 5 is 10 mm. If the master-slave scale ratio is 0.1, the movement amount of the master arm 8 is 10 mm
On the other hand, the movement amount of the slave (treatment) arm 5 is 1 mm
Becomes However, in this case, the system is configured so that the same scale ratio can be applied to the position, but the same can be applied to the angle ratio between the master side and the slave side.

Regarding the sensitivity, for observation, for example, by changing the input sensitivity of the magnetic sensor 10 on the master side, the size of the dead zone of the observation arm 7 on the slave side can be changed. For example, if the input sensitivity to the position is set to 1 mm, the magnetic sensor 1
The slave (observation) arm 7 does not operate unless 0 moves by 1 mm or more. As a result, it is possible to avoid the inconvenience that the slave side performs useless movement due to the surgeon's habit of movement.

Now, turn on the power supply of the control device 11,
After calling the first parameter data, it is now necessary to determine where the current position on the slave side is. That is, it is necessary to detect the absolute positions of the slave arms 5 and 7.

If the encoder of the servo motor arranged in the slave arms 5 and 7 is an absolute position encoder,
Although it can be used as it is, the absolute position encoder is expensive, and in consideration of the cost, an incremental encoder is generally used. Since this incremental encoder can only detect the relative movement amount, if the slave configuration using the incremental encoder is performed, the work of returning to the origin becomes necessary.

The origin return work is to set a reference position by returning each arm 5, 7 to a predetermined shape, calculate the count value of the incremental encoder from the reference position, and determine the current position. It is to detect whether or not the arms 5 and 7 are positioned.
When this operation is performed, it is necessary to decide in which order the origin return is performed when the power of the control device 11 is turned on. This is because if an obstacle or the like exists near the slave arms 5 and 7, the slave arm 5 or 7 may collide with the obstacle and destroy the obstacle as well as the slave arms 5 and 7. Because there is.

In this system, in particular, the servo motors of the slave arms 5 and 7 are provided with an incremental encoder so that the origin return operation can be performed. The selection menu at this time (origin return order selection menu) is shown in FIG. To use this menu, use the numeric input keys on the keyboard 13 to set the return order in the underbar on the menu. The entered numerical value is confirmed by pressing the confirmation key. With these settings, the microcontroller 11
The set value is constantly recognized by the program contained in a so that the same return sequence does not exist.
If the same return axis exists, the value is not input and a warning such as "The same return order exists" is displayed on the menu screen.

In this example, the case where the order of the origin return sequence is arbitrarily set has been described. However, if the return sequence is also stored as a control parameter, the floppy disk drive is turned on after the controller 11 is powered on. It is also possible to read the return order together with the control parameter information read from the disk, and perform the origin return in the same return order as the previous observation / treatment. The saving of the origin return order is performed as follows, for example. That is, after the control program is finished, the operator is asked whether or not the program saves the current return sequence, and the operator performs a saving operation as necessary.

When the previous return order is read from the floppy disk, the previous numerical value is displayed in the underbar portion on the origin return menu screen of FIG. 7 (d). Then, this time, if the operator is prepared to perform the same return order as the previous one, the operator may just press the confirm key. In this case, each time the enter key is pressed, the cursor on the screen moves down one menu after another. At this time, if it is desired to change the return-to-origin order for a certain axis, it is sufficient to input a numerical value for that portion and press the enter key to confirm the numerical value.

In the present system in which the servo motors of the slave arms 5 and 7 are provided with the incremental encoders, the next work cannot be performed unless the origin return work is performed. Whether or not the home-return operation has been performed is recognized by the microcontroller 11a. Further, the origin return work need not be performed unless the power of the control device 11 is turned off. Therefore, after the power is turned on, the origin return work is performed only once unless there is a special reason.

As described above, the slave arm 5,
When the position detecting means of the servo motor unit 7 is an incremental encoder, it is necessary to perform the home-returning work. After this work is completed, the treatment tool 4 and the scope 6 are then attached to the treatment arm 5 and the observing arm 7. Work to attach to.

This mounting operation is performed after operating the slave arms 5 and 7 from the reference position where the origin has been returned and moving the tips of the slave arms 5 and 7 to desired positions.
This is because the distance from the operating table 1 to the abdominal wall varies depending on the patient, and the insertion hole 2a needs to be determined for each patient. In order to perform this work, it is necessary to allow each axis of the slave manipulator to move arbitrarily. Therefore, in this system, each axis is assigned to the key of the keyboard 13. For example, pressing the 1 key drives the first axis from the operating table 1 side, and pressing the 2 key drives the second axis from the operating table 1 side. By doing so, each axis of the slave manipulator can be arbitrarily moved by the cursor key of the keyboard 13.

When the movement of each axis of the slave manipulator is completed, the enter key is pressed to complete the above work. Observation and treatment in the master-slave mode can be performed only after performing the above series of operations. In this case, needless to say, it is convenient to make this series of operations into an interactive menu so that the operator can visually check which work has been completed and which work has not been completed.

Next, the operation in the actual master-slave mode will be described. As described above, the master / slave mode is turned on / off by the foot switch 12. The master-slave mode is turned on when the foot switch 12 is continuously depressed twice, and is turned off when the foot switch 12 is depressed once again. As shown in FIG. 2, the foot switch 12 includes two switches 12a and 12a.
b is provided, but master-slave mode is ON
ON / OFF can be switched by selecting either of the switches 12a, 12
The control device 11 is configured to recognize it even when the user presses b.

Here, the reason why the two switches 12a and 12b are provided on the foot switch 12 is that the above-mentioned control parameters can be increased or decreased when the scale ratio or the sensitivity is changed, for example. This is so that it can be done. For example, pressing the switch 12a can increase the values of the scale ratio and the sensitivity, and conversely, pressing the switch 12b can decrease the values of the scale ratio and the sensitivity.

When the power of the control unit 11 is turned on, FIG.
The menu shown in (b) is displayed on the edge of the screen of the HMD 9 (see (a) in FIG. 7). At this time, foot switch 1
When the switch 2a of 2, for example, is depressed, the cursor on the menu moves downward. When the switch 12b is stepped on, the cursor on the menu moves upward. When the foot switch 12 is continuously stepped twice, the part of the menu where the cursor is located is selected.

In order to enter the master-slave mode, the operator mounts the HMD 9 on the head, holds the master arm 8, and steps on the foot switch 12 twice, so that the following discussion will be made.

In the master-slave mode, when the operator moves the z-axis of the coordinate system set at the tip of the master arm 8 in the dotted line direction as shown in FIG. 4A, the slave (treatment) arm 5 Also, as shown in FIG. 4B, the z axis moves along the dotted line. In short, the vector S of the slave arm 5 follows the same movement as the vector M at the tip of the master arm 8.

In order to enable such operation, the above-mentioned coordinate conversion is performed on the side of the microcontroller 11a. Thereby, for example, when the direction of the master arm 8 is moved in the Y direction in FIG. 4A, the treatment tool 4 is oriented in the Y direction in FIG. 8 so that the movement amount is the same as the movement amount of 8
The tip of the arm is curved and the slave (treatment) arm 5 moves. In the correspondence shown in FIG. 4, since the scale ratio is 0.5, the slave arm 5 moves with a movement amount that is half the movement amount of the master arm 8.

In the observation manipulator, the observation arm 7 and the scope 6 operate following the operation of the HMD 9 attached to the head, similarly to the above-described operation of the treatment manipulator. For example, when the HMD 9 is moved from the point P shown in FIG. 5A to the point Q along the dotted line (this operation corresponds to the case where the operator advances forward), the slave side. Scope 6 of Figure 5
Move from point S shown in (b) to point T along the dotted line.

As described above, the manipulators 5 and 7 on the slave side are operated according to the operation of the master arm 8 by the operator and the movement of the head of the operator.

When performing the above-mentioned coordinate conversion, it is necessary to define the initial coordinate system on the microcontroller 11a side. This will be described below. For example, the treatment slave manipulator is operated by performing coordinate conversion processing on how much the xyz coordinate system has moved (relative movement amount) with reference to the XYZ coordinate system of FIG. Here, the position / orientation at the tip of the master arm 8 when the master-slave mode is turned on is set in the reference coordinate system of the master arm 8, and the current position / orientation of the tip of the treatment slave manipulator is treated. It is set to the reference coordinate system of the slave manipulator. Then, the movement amount of the master arm 8 from the reference coordinate system is reflected in the movement amount of the slave manipulator. Expressed in robot terms, this means that the operation of the mechanical interface coordinate system of the master arm 8 and the operation of the mechanical interface coordinate system of the treatment slave manipulator are associated with each other. According to this method, the reference coordinate system of the master arm 8 can be arbitrarily set, so that the master-slave operation by the master arm 8 can be performed from an arbitrary place.

The shape of the solid line in FIG. 8A is the shape of the master arm 8 when the master-slave mode is turned on.
Shows the shape of. The shape of the dotted line is the master arm 8 in the + Z direction in the figure along the line drawn by the dashed line.
Master arm 8 when moving the tip coordinate system xyz of
Shows the shape of. Master-slave mode O
At the time of N, the treatment slave manipulator side has the shape shown in (1) of FIG. 8B.

Now, in FIG. 8B, when the tip of the master arm 8 is moved from the position P _{M to} the position Q _M , the treatment slave manipulator moves to the position shown in FIG. and moved from the slave tip position P _S to the slave end position Q _S (2) of (b) Fig. Here, when the tip position of the master arm 8 reaches the position of Q _M as shown by the dotted line in FIG. 8A, the master arm 8 cannot move further in the + Z direction due to a mechanical limitation. Therefore, the slave manipulator cannot be moved to the slave tip position R _S shown in (3) of FIG. 8B. In order to eliminate such inconvenience, the master-slave mode is turned off once. After turning off the master-slave mode, move the master arm 8 from the shape (tip position Q _M ) indicated by the dotted line to
It moves in the arrow-Z direction in FIG. 8A to restore the shape of the solid line drawn by the solid line. That is, the tip position of the master arm 8 is returned to P _M.

When the tip position of the master arm 8 is returned to P _M , the master-slave mode is turned on again and the master arm 8 is moved so as to have the shape shown by the dotted line. That is, the tip position of the master arm 8 is moved from P _M to Q _M along the dashed line. At this time, the treatment slave manipulator side is changed from the state (2) in FIG. 8B to the state (3) (the treatment tool 4 on the slave side).
The tip position of moves from Q _S to R _S ).

As described above, in the present system, since the correspondence between the tip position of the master arm 8 and the tip position of the treatment slave manipulator is operated by the relative movement amount, the master arm 8 is moved to an arbitrary position. It is possible to eliminate the operational limitation of the master arm 8 by causing the master arm 8 to operate in the master-slave mode. Further, according to this method, even if the master arm 8 is in an unnatural posture during the operation by the operator, if the master-slave mode is turned off at that time, the operator can easily operate the position. Since the master arm 8 can be reset, the operability is improved.

Next, a method for converting the control parameter during the operation will be specifically described. For example, it is assumed that the operator moves his head to search the inside of the body cavity to observe a desired portion, and the target portion is confirmed. After that, the treatment is actually performed by the treatment tool, but the scale in observation may be somewhat large because it is necessary to approach the desired site while looking around the body cavity as a whole,
It may be better to reduce this scale ratio when performing treatment. For example, in general, the target site to be treated is often only a part of the body cavity of the patient, and even if the master arm 8 slightly moves, the treatment tool 4 may be used.
The amount of movement may be considerable with respect to the target site. As a result, the treatment tool 4 may move to a site that should not be treated, and may damage a normal site.

Therefore, after the positioning of the observing arm 7 to the target portion is almost completed, the foot switch 12 is once stepped on to turn off the master-slave mode. OFF
After that, a menu for changing the scale ratio as shown in FIG. 7B is displayed in the portion A shown in FIG. 7A.

The scale ratio is turned up by, for example, an operator pressing the switch 12a of the foot switch 12, and the switch 1
If you step on 2b, you will go down. When the foot switch 12 is stepped on, the arrow portion (UP and DOWN cursors) in the screen of FIG. 7B displayed on the display unit of the HMD 9 blinks. The change amount (resolution) of the scale ratio at this time is set in advance at the time of setup, so that an arbitrary scale ratio resolution can be obtained. According to this method, conversion of the scale ratio is performed by the foot switch 12
Since it becomes possible by using, the operator can arbitrarily change the scale ratio at any time during the operation. When the master-slave mode is turned on again after the scale ratio conversion setting is completed, the foot switch may be stepped on twice continuously.

The master slave mode is terminated by pressing an arbitrarily set key on the keyboard 13. For example, the Q key is generally assigned. As a work procedure for the operator to actually turn off the master-slave mode, the foot-switch 12 once turns off the master-slave mode. As a result, a command is not output to the surgical slave manipulator, so that the slave manipulator does not operate even when the operator moves to operate the keyboard 13. Therefore, when the operator approaches the control device 11 to operate the keyboard 13 and presses the Q key of the keyboard 13, the master-slave control program ends. After the end, the control program may be ended as it is, or the parameter may be changed (the operation setting of the foot switch 12 is changed from the scale ratio to the sensitivity) and the master-slave mode may be performed again. .

As described above, according to the surgical manipulator system of this embodiment, the scope 6 and the treatment tool 4 are used.
Since the control parameters such as the scale ratio of can be arbitrarily changed, the operability is improved. In other words, the amount of movement of the surgical instrument that operates in accordance with the operation of the operator's operation means can be made to correspond to the amount of movement that is easy for the operator to use, and therefore the operability is good.

Next, a second embodiment of the present invention will be described. In the first embodiment, the rough positioning is performed by the observation manipulator and the fine positioning operation is performed by the treatment manipulator. However, in the second embodiment, the system configuration similar to that of the first embodiment is adopted. The scale ratio of the manipulators for observation and treatment can be changed independently.

This can be achieved by using a hierarchical menu. For example, when the foot switch 12 is continuously depressed three times, the menu returns to the upper hierarchical menu, and when the pedal is depressed twice, the lower hierarchical menu is displayed. When the foot switch 12 is depressed once, the cursor of the current menu is selected. And so on. Thereby, the foot switch 12 can independently change the scale ratio of the manipulator for observation and the manipulator for treatment. This is shown below as a series of working examples.

When inputting the master-slave mode,
One of the two foot switches 12a and 12b is continuously depressed three times. After stepping on, A shown in FIG.
The menu shown in (e) of FIG. After this, the surgeon observes and
Although the treatment is performed, when it is desired to change the scale ratio of the treatment instrument 4 on the way, the foot switches 12a and 12b are used.
Be sure to step on one of the two once. When the foot switch is stepped on, the menu shown in FIG. 7B is displayed in FIG. 7E.
It is displayed like a pop-up menu below the menu shown in (see (f) of FIG. 7). After such a display is made, if the foot switch 12a is intermittently stepped on, the scale ratio is increased, and if the foot switch 12a is intermittently stepped on, the scale ratio is D.
OWN.

After the desired scale ratio is selected, if one of the foot switches 12a and 12b is continuously depressed twice, the pop-up menu shown in FIG. 7B is closed, and the original Only the menu shown in FIG. 7E is displayed. As a result, it is possible to call the screen of the popup menu and erase the screen.
Further, returning to the menu (see (c) of FIG. 7) when the power of the control device 11 is turned on, not only the master / slave mode but also the teaching mode, the reproduction mode and the parameters can be changed.

According to the above method, the scale ratio of the manipulator for treatment and the scale for observation can be set arbitrarily and independently, so that the operability is further improved as compared with the first embodiment. Needless to say.

Next, a third embodiment of the present invention will be described. In the present embodiment, even if the operator changes during surgery, the width of the dead zone with respect to the operation amount of the operator can be arbitrarily set.

In the first and second embodiments described above, an example in which the scale ratio can be arbitrarily changed in the master-slave mode has been described.
It is also possible that the operator changes along the way and observes and treats. This embodiment focuses on these points.

The operating method differs depending on the operator. Therefore, the operation of the master-slave type manipulator sometimes becomes difficult to operate. Such a problem is caused by the width of the dead zone (hereinafter referred to as sensitivity) with respect to the amount of operation by the operator.
It is solved by changing.

The sensitivity will be described below by taking an observation manipulator as an example. As described above, in the manipulator system for observation, the observation is performed by mounting the HMD 9 on the head of the operator. The magnetic sensor 10 is attached to the HMD 9 as described above. As shown in (a) of FIG. 6, for example, the surgeon may actually shake up and down even though he or she does not intend to do anything. Such a position change is detected by the magnetic sensor 10, and the control device 11 operates the observation slave manipulator based on the position change information from the magnetic sensor 10.

When the operator moves up and down, the observing slave manipulator moves in an oscillating manner, which has a bad effect on the patient. Vibration of the slave slave manipulator for observation also occurs in response to the lateral movement as shown in FIG.

In order to solve these problems, the magnetic sensor 1 is incorporated in the microcontroller 11a of the controller 11.
A change in the input value from 0 has a threshold value, and the observation slave manipulator does not operate unless the threshold value is exceeded. In order to realize this, a filter program for performing threshold value judgment is inserted into the program built in the microcontroller 11a. For example, unless the movement amount of the magnetic sensor 10 is 1 mm or more,
Prevent the slave manipulator for observation from operating.

A simple filter program is shown below as a concrete example. That is, in this program,
The process of taking in the data from the magnetic sensor 10 and taking the difference from the previously taken in data is performed. Thereby, the relative movement amount is calculated. This calculated value is compared with a predetermined constant (sensitivity), and when the calculated value exceeds the constant, the amount of movement (relative movement)
Is sent to the DSP 11b as a position command to perform slave operation, and if the calculated value is less than the above constant, the DSP is
No position command is sent to 11b. By adding such a filter program as a subroutine to the program contained in the microcontroller 11a, the sensitivity can be easily adjusted.

According to such a method, even if the operator changes during the operation, the sensitivity can be changed to an arbitrary sensitivity suitable for the operator. The operation at this time is ON / O of the foot switch 12 as in the first and second embodiments described above.
The master / slave mode may be turned ON / OFF by the FF operation, and a menu corresponding to the sensitivity may be displayed at the edge on the screen of the HMD 9. This menu is the same as the display menu shown in FIGS. 7B and 7E. However, the character “SCALE” in FIG. 7B is replaced by the word “sensitivity”, and the character “scale” in FIG. 7E is replaced by the word “sensitivity”. Also,
The operation method is also the same as the scale conversion method described in the first and second embodiments. In addition, here, the sensitivity change in the case of the manipulator for observation was explained,
Similar sensitivity adjustment can be performed in the case of the treatment manipulator.

As described above, according to this embodiment,
Even if the operator changes during the operation, the sensitivity can be arbitrarily changed in the master-slave mode, so that the master-slave operation suitable for the operator can be performed.

Next, a fourth embodiment of the present invention will be described. In this embodiment, the operation amount of the operator is limited, and the surgical instrument is restrained according to an arbitrary surgical instrument restraint condition when a preset limit amount is exceeded.

In the configuration of the first embodiment, if the master arm 8 or the magnetic sensor 10 as the operation input means is moved too early, there is a possibility that the patient may be injured. This is because the system faithfully transmits information from the input means operated by the operator to the surgical instrument (the treatment instrument 4 and the scope 6).

Therefore, in this embodiment, the treatment tool 4 and the scope 6 are prevented from recognizing unnecessary movements that the operator does not intend. For example, when excessive speed information is input, the information is ignored. This is provided with a limiter for the speed / position inside the microcontroller 11a, and when the limiter value is exceeded, a program is configured to temporarily stop the slave operation while making an alarm sound. In addition to the temporary stop, the control program may be automatically terminated when the input unit (the master arm 8 and the magnetic sensor 10) operates at an excessively high speed as in the case of the abnormality processing. Absent.

Further, even if excessive speed information is input, the position from the input means is stored in the magnetic sensor interface 11d or the up / down counter 11e, so the speed is kept constant after the slave manipulator is temporarily stopped. Then, if the slave manipulator is automatically moved to the absolute position, even if the master side overspeed operation is performed, the absolute position shift does not occur.

In such a configuration, it is convenient for operation if the operator is notified by sound that excessive speed information has been input from the operating means. Needless to say, not only sound but also light or vibration felt by the operator may be generated.

As described above, according to this embodiment,
Even if an operation unintended by the operator occurs, the surgical instrument can be prevented from performing an operation that may harm the patient. Therefore, the safety to the patient can be improved.

Next explained is the fifth embodiment of the invention. In the above-described first and second embodiments, the ratio of the amount of information from the operating means (the master arm 8 and the magnetic sensor 10) to the amount of information reflected in the operation of the surgical instrument (the treatment tool 4 and the scope 6) is changed. By doing so, the operability was improved, but for example, if the operator is always a fixed person and the pattern of the operative method is also constant, as shown in the first and second embodiments, it is possible to arbitrarily It may be unnecessary to change the scale ratio. For example, this is the case where the positioning is roughly performed with respect to the surgical site, and then the surgical instrument is finely operated in order to perform a detailed work.

In this case, as shown in the first and second embodiments, this can be dealt with without performing the work of stepping the foot switch 12 several times to arbitrarily set the scale ratio. For example, when the foot switch 12 is pressed once, a rough movement is performed, and when the foot switch is stepped twice in succession, a fine movement is performed. Therefore, it is possible to switch between the fine movement and the fine movement. Good. Further, the scale ratio at the time of the seizure / fine movement may be input in advance to the storage means of the microcontroller 11a in the control device 11, or may be set to an arbitrary value in advance from the keyboard 13.

According to such a method, since it is only necessary to switch between the spontaneous movement and the fine movement, it becomes very easy to operate the system. In addition, according to the aspect described above, various configurations shown in the following sections can be obtained.

1. A surgical manipulator for performing at least one of observation and treatment of an in-vivo tissue site, operating means for operating the operating manipulator, and controlling operation of the operating manipulator based on operation information from the operating means. A surgical manipulator system comprising: a control means; and a parameter varying means capable of arbitrarily changing a control parameter required for controlling the operation of the surgical manipulator.

2. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 1, wherein one of the control parameters is a scale ratio between an operation amount of the operation means and a movement amount of the surgery manipulator.

3. The manipulator system for surgery according to the first aspect, wherein one of the control parameters is a width of a dead zone with respect to an operation amount of the operation means. 4. The manipulator system for surgery according to item 1, wherein the operating means is a master manipulator.

5. The manipulator system for surgery according to the first aspect, wherein the operating means is a position detection sensor. 6. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the position detection sensor is a magnetic sensor.

7. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the position detection sensor is an ultrasonic sensor. 8. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the position detection sensor is a strain gauge sensor.

9. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the position detection sensor is a pressure sensor. 10. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the position detection sensor is an optical sensor.

11. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 5, wherein the optical sensor is a CCD. 12. The surgical manipulator system according to claim 1, wherein the surgical manipulator has a surgical instrument.

13. 13. The surgical manipulator system according to claim 12, wherein the surgical instrument is an endoscope. 14. Item 13. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 12, wherein the surgical instrument is an endoscope with a bending function.

15. 13. The manipulator system for surgery according to claim 12, wherein the surgical instrument is a treatment tool. 16. Item 13. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 12, wherein the surgical instrument is a treatment tool with a bending function.

17. 13. The surgical manipulator system according to claim 12, wherein the surgical instrument is configured by integrally forming an endoscope and a treatment tool. 18. 13. The surgical manipulator system according to claim 12, further comprising switching means for switching the operation of the surgical instrument between fine movement and coarse movement.

19. Item 19. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 18, wherein the switching means is a foot switch. 20. Item 19. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 18, wherein the switching unit is a switch attached in the vicinity of a grip portion of the operation unit that is gripped by an operator.

21. 13. The surgical manipulator system according to claim 12, further comprising limit means for preventing the surgical instrument from operating when the information from the operating means exceeds a preset upper limit value.

22. Item 22. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 21, further comprising notification means for notifying an operator of the information from the operation means when the information exceeds a preset upper limit value.

23. Item 23. The manipulator system for surgery according to Item 22, wherein the notifying unit appeals to the hearing of the operator. 24. Item 23. The manipulator system for surgery according to Item 22, wherein the notifying means appeals to an operator's visual sense. 25. Item 23. The surgical manipulator system according to Item 22, wherein the notifying unit applies vibration to the operator.

[0111]

As described above, according to the surgical manipulator of the present invention, the control parameter can be changed to a state in which it can be easily operated by the operator, so that the operability is improved and the operation time is shortened. Can be planned. In particular,
If the control parameters are variously changed during the operation, various kinds of operations suitable for the surgical situation can be performed, and the variety of operations is expanded. In addition, since the operation does not require skill, it is possible to prevent the patient from being harmed by an erroneous operation, and it is possible to sufficiently secure the safety for the patient.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a detailed view of a treatment tool and a scope provided on a slave side manipulator of a surgical manipulator system of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an overall configuration diagram of a surgical manipulator system of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a circuit diagram showing a signal circuit from a foot switch to a microcontroller.

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing a correspondence of operations of manipulators on a master side and a slave side for treatment.

FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram showing a correspondence between operations on the master side and the slave side for observation.

FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining the movement of the head of the operator who has attached the HMD to the head.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a menu for changing control parameters.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a mechanism capable of canceling the limitation on the operation amount of the master-side manipulator.

[Explanation of symbols]

4 ... Treatment tool, 5 ... Treatment arm (surgical manipulator), 6 ... Scope, 7 ... Observation arm (surgical manipulator), 8 ... Master arm (operating means), 9 ... H
MD (operating means), 11 ... Control device (control means).

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A surgical manipulator for observing and / or treating an in vivo tissue site, operating means for operating the operating manipulator, and the operating manipulator based on operation information from the operating means. A manipulator system for surgery, comprising: a control means for controlling the operation of the surgical manipulator; and a parameter varying means capable of arbitrarily changing a control parameter required for controlling the operation of the surgical manipulator.