Title: Robotic Assistance and Image Guidance for Prostate Brachytherapy

Speaker: Dr. Mahdi Tavakoli

Mahdi Tavakoli is a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Canada. He received his PhD degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Western Ontario, Canada, in 2005. In 2006, he was a post-doctoral researcher at Canadian Surgical Technologies and Advanced Robotics (CSTAR), Canada. In 2007-2008, he was an NSERC Post-Doctoral Fellow at Harvard University, USA. Dr. Tavakoli’s research focuses on haptics and teleoperation control, medical robotics, and image-guided surgery. Dr. Tavakoli is an Associate Editor for the Journal of Medical Robotics Research, for Mechatronics, and for Control Engineering Practice. He is the lead author of Haptics for Teleoperated Surgical Robotic Systems (World Scientific, 2008).

Abstract: This presentation will explore some of the potentials of robotics technologies for improving healthcare by making surgeries and therapies more efficient – we will consider prostate brachytherapy as an example. In permanent implant brachytherapy, needles loaded with radioactive seeds are used to reach planned locations in the prostate, where the seeds are deployed. Accurate seed placement is a key factor that influences the effectiveness of the procedure. However, current manual techniques can place seeds with an accuracy of only about 5 mm. This is a substantial error given the average prostate size and narrows the scope of brachytherapy to primarily treating the entire prostate gland for patients with localized prostate cancer. We will discuss mechatronic technologies for precisely steering a needle towards its intended location in a controlled manner.

تاریخ برگزاری: 1396/4/20

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