JPS63140789A - Piercing method for eyeless suture needle - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To stabilize the dimension of the shape of a needle hole and to reduce a spattering by cutting one part of a laser light as well as providing an optical shutter between a suture needle and laser oscillator and feeding the balance to the original end part of the suture needle. CONSTITUTION:The optical shutter 25 opening and closing via an electricity is arranged in the medium of a laser light oscillator 1 and the optical path of the original end part 50 of a suture needle 50 and a switching circuit 29 and delay circuit 18 are provided as well. When a high pressure voltage is impressed on a trigger electrode 2d and a laser light is projected from the oscillator 1 the outputs of the rise part and fall part of the laser light output are cut via the switching circuit 29 and delay circuit 18, the output part of the intermediate only is fed to the suture needle 50 and the piercing is performed. Owing to the unstable laser light output part being cut by the curtain 25 the shape and dimension of the needle 50 is stabilized and the spattering generation is reduced as well.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (Industrial Application Field) The present invention relates to a method of making a hole for attaching a suture thread in the proximal end of a surgical eyeless suture needle using pulses of laser light.

(Prior art) In a surgical eyeless suture needle, a hole with a predetermined depth is formed at the proximal end along the axis of the needle. The suture thread is attached to the suture needle by crimping.

As one method for making this hole, especially when the diameter of the suture needle is small, a processing method using pulsed laser light is known. In this processing method, the energy of the laser is used to sublimate the material to make a hole, and is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Nos. 52-111294 and 60-17059.
i) Publication, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 184485, Japanese Utility Model Publication No. 56-37918, Japanese Unexamined Utility Model Publication No. 55-43691
Improvements have been made as described in the publications.

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) However, with the above method, it is difficult to make the diameter, depth, and shape of the hole constant. In addition, a phenomenon called sputtering, in which the material sublimated by the laser beam does not scatter out of the hole but adheres to the inner wall and solidifies, sometimes occurs, making it difficult to insert the suture thread.

Furthermore, if the outer diameter of the suture needle is small and the wall around the hole drilled at the proximal end is thin, for example, when drilling a hole with a laser beam in a suture needle used for brain surgery, etc., Parts of the wall around the hole were often melted and destroyed.

By conducting the following experiment, the present inventor discovered that one of the causes of the above-mentioned disadvantages lies in the output characteristics of the laser beam.

In detail, parallel laser light from a laser light oscillator is reflected by a gicroic mirror, and the reflected laser light is focused by a condensing lens and applied to the end face of the proximal end of the suture needle to make the hole. During processing, we measured the energy of the laser light that leaked to the back side of this guichroic mirror, and investigated the relationship between this leaked laser light and the occurrence of defective products. Note that since the leakage amount has a certain relationship with the output of laser light from the oscillator, the relationship between the output of laser light from the oscillator and defective products will be explained below. In other words, the output of the laser light varies greatly for each pulse between its rising and falling parts, and especially the falling part. It was also discovered that the fluctuations in the rising and falling parts are related to the occurrence of defective products.

The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned disadvantages by paying attention to the output characteristics of laser light as described above.

(Means for Solving the Problems) The gist of the present invention is to provide a method in which a hole for attaching a suture thread is made at the base end of a suture needle using a pulse of laser light. between the ends,
An eyeless system is equipped with an optical shutter that opens and closes electrically, and by opening and closing this optical shutter, a part of the laser light output is cut, and the remaining part is transmitted and supplied to the base end of the suture needle. The hole for the suture needle is determined by the method.

(Function) A stable output portion of the laser beam from the oscillator can be selected by an optical shutter and supplied to the proximal end of the suture needle, and the supply time of this laser beam can be adjusted to be short. I can do it. As a result, the diameter, depth, and shape of the hole drilled in the suture needle by the laser beam is stable, there is less sputtering, and the occurrence of inconveniences such as melting and destruction of the wall around the hole is reduced. I can do it.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described based on the drawings. FIG. 1 shows an apparatus for carrying out the invention. 1 in the diagram
is a laser light oscillator, and this oscillator 1 is a lamp 2
and a YAG rod 3 that is excited by the light from the lamp 2 and outputs laser light. These lamps 2 and rods 3 are arranged horizontally, for example.

The lamp 2 includes a bulb 2a filled with xenon gas, and 7-node electrodes 2b provided at both ends of the bulb 2a.
It has a cathode ring Fi,2c, and a trigger electrode 1M2d disposed outside the bulb 2a.

A total reflection mirror 4 and a half reflection mirror 5 are arranged near both ends of the rod 3.

The DC power supply ■a for discharging and emitting light from the lamp 2 includes:
A capacitor 11 is connected via a thyristor 10. One end of this capacitor 11 is connected to the 7-made electrode 2b of the lamp 2 via an air-core filter 12 and a diode 13.
The terminal of the capacitor 11 is connected to the cathode ring k 2 c of the lamp 2.

DC power source v for triggering the discharge light emission of the lamp 2
b is connected to the step-up transformer 1 via the switching circuit 15.
The secondary coil 16b of the step-up transformer 16 is connected to the trigger voltage fM2cl of the lamp 2.

The switching circuit 15 is controlled by a charge completion signal from a voltage monitoring circuit 17 connected to the fundacor 11 described above.

A guichroic mirror 20 is arranged at an angle of 45° in the optical axis direction of the rod 3 mentioned above. A condensing lens 21 is arranged below this guichroic mirror 20, and the proximal end 51 of the suture needle 50 is centered near the focal position below this condensing lens 21. .

An optical shutter 25 is provided between the semi-reflective mirror 5 and the gicroic mirror 20 of the laser beam oscillator 1. The optical shutter 25 includes, for example, two polarizers 26 and 27 and a crystal cell 28 interposed between the polarizers 26 and 27. The voltage f of this cell 28
When a voltage is applied between f128a and 28b, the laser light is blocked, and when no voltage is applied, the laser light is allowed to pass through.6 Both electrodes 28a and 28b of the cell 28 are used for switching. It is connected to a DC power supply Vc via a circuit 29. This switching circuit 29 is controlled by a control signal from a delay circuit 18 connected to the secondary filter 16b of the step-up transformer 16.

The method of the present invention executed by the above-mentioned apparatus will be explained based on a time chart. When one signal is input to the thyristor 10, this thyristor 10 turns on,
The DC power supply Va and the capacitor 11 are connected, and the capacitor 11 is charged.

Incidentally, when the capacitor 11 is charged to the saturation voltage, the thyristor 10 is turned off, and the next drilling waits for a trigger signal at the end of the machining process.

When the voltage of the capacitor 11 is saturated, the voltage monitoring device 17 detects this and sends a charge completion signal to the switching circuit 15. As a result, the switching circuit 15 is opened and the voltage of the DC power supply vb is applied to a portion of the coil 16a of the step-up transformer 16. A high voltage is momentarily excited in the secondary coil 16b by the transient current at this time, and this high voltage is applied to one electrode 2d of the lamp 2. As a result, a discharge occurs instantaneously between the minus electrode 2d, the 7-node electrode 2b, and the cathode electrode 2c.

This discharge triggers the 7-node voltage ff12b and the cathode 2c to which the voltage of the capacitor 11 has been applied in advance.
A main discharge is started between the two, and light is emitted by this main discharge.

The light from the lamp 2 is concentrated and supplied to the rod 3 by a reflecting mirror (not shown). Inside the rod 3, the electrons of the neodymium ions excited by the light move to a high-energy level orbit, and when this returns to the normal energy level, a laser beam is emitted. is amplified by going back and forth between
The high-power laser beam passes through the semi-reflective mirror 5 and exits the oscillator 1.

Incidentally, the difference between the light emission time of the lamp 2 and the output time of the laser beam is very short, and can be ignored when discussing in units of 100 μSee as described later, and it may be assumed that they are almost simultaneous.

The characteristics of the laser light output with respect to time are, for example, the second
This is shown by a curve X in the figure. As previously mentioned,
The rising portion Xs and the falling portion Xf of the laser light output have large output fluctuations for each laser light pulse, and especially the falling portion Xf'''C has a large fluctuation, but is stable in the intermediate portion XL11.

The output of the laser beam is, for example, approximately 100 μs after a single voltage is applied to the trigger electrode 2d of the lamp 2.
It starts after the ec has passed, and the bird is about 900 seconds from the application of one voltage.
It ends after μSee. Therefore, the output time of the laser beam is approximately 800 μsec.

In this embodiment, by opening and closing the optical shutter 25, ! of the above laser light output is reduced. In addition to cutting the 100 μsec rising portion Xs of 41, the last 400 μsec
Cut the falling part Xf of sec, 300μsec
Only the middle portion Xm of c is supplied to the suture needle 50 for making a hole.

Specifically, when a high voltage is applied to the trigger electrode 2d of the lamp 2, an ON control signal is sent from the delay circuit 18 to the switching circuit 29, and the first . Second. A third three timers start running.

The first ON control signal from the delay circuit 18 closes the switching circuit 29 and applies voltage to the electrodes 28a and 28b of the optical shutter 25.

As a result, the laser light is blocked.

Next, when the set time of the first timer of 200 μsec has elapsed, an OFF control signal is output from the delay circuit 18, the switching circuit 29 is opened, and no voltage is applied to the electrodes 28a and 28b. As a result, the optical shutter 25
The laser light passes through it.

Next, when the second timer set time of 500 μsec has elapsed, the delay circuit 18 outputs the ON control signal again, the switching circuit 29 closes, and the laser beam is cut off again.

Finally, set the third timer to 1000μSe, for example.
When e has elapsed, the OFF control signal is output again. As a result, it becomes possible for the laser light to pass through the optical shutter 25, but at this time the output of the laser light has ended.

As mentioned above, 300 μS of the laser light output is
Only the middle portion Xm of ee will be transmitted.

Note that the intermediate portion Xm is attenuated when passing through the optical shutter 25, and reaches the level indicated by diagonal lines in the diagram $2.

The transmitted laser light is reflected by the guichroic mirror 20, focused by the condensing lens 26, and hits the end surface of the proximal end 51 of the suture needle 50, sublimating the material and forming the hole 52.

As described above, since only the laser beam of the intermediate portion Xm having a stable energy level is supplied for drilling, the diameter, depth, and shape of the hole 52 can be made almost constant.
Sputtering caused by excessive energy of the laser beam and destruction of the wall around the hole 52 can also be prevented. moreover,
In this point, the output portion that has a low energy level and does not contribute to the sublimation of the material of the suture needle 50 and merely melts the material, that is, the rising portion Xs and the falling portion Xf, is cut, and the output time is limited to a short time. Additionally, destruction of the wall around the hole 52 can be prevented.

The straight suture needle 50 with the hole 52 made as described above is bent, one end of a suture thread (not shown) is inserted into the hole 52, and the base end 51 is swaged. A suture is attached to suture needle 50.

The present invention is not limited to the above embodiments, and various embodiments are possible. For example, the optical shutter may be of a type that allows laser light to pass only when a voltage is applied.

Further, the polarizer 26 may be arranged at the mirror 4.5 opening,
Furthermore, the polarizer 26°27 may be omitted.

(Effects of the Invention) As explained above, in the present invention, a pulse of laser light whose energy level is stable and which is limited to a relatively short period of time can be applied to a suture needle. The diameter, depth, and shape are stable, there is less sputtering, and it is possible to reduce problems such as melting and destruction of the wall around the hole.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

The drawings show one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 1 is an electric circuit diagram;
@Figure 2 is a diagram showing the output of the laser beam from the oscillator and the output portion that passes through the optical shutter, Figure 3 is a diagram showing the hole made in the suture needle by the laser beam, and Figure 4 is a time chart diagram. It is. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Laser light oscillator, 25... Optical shunter, 50... Suture needle, 51... Base end, 52... Hole.

Claims (3)

[Claims] (1) In a method in which a hole for attaching a suture thread is made at the proximal end of a suture needle using pulses of laser light, an optical shutter that opens and closes electrically is installed between the laser beam oscillator and the proximal end of the suture needle. A method for making a hole in an eyeless suture needle, characterized in that by opening and closing this optical shutter, a part of the output of the laser beam is cut, and the remaining part is transmitted and supplied to the proximal end of the suture needle. . (2) The method for drilling an eyeless suture needle according to claim 1, wherein at least a falling portion of the laser light output is cut by the optical shutter. (3) The method for drilling an eyeless suture needle according to claim 1, in which the optical shutter cuts the rising and falling portions of the laser light output and allows only the intermediate portion to pass through.