Interactive visualization and manipulation of 3-D reconstructions for the planning of surgical procedures

The requirements for 3-D reconstructions to be useful in a clinical environment include availability of the imaging and computing hardware; sophisticated and user-friendly software that can be used by physicians or technicians; robust data that can be efficiently segmented into clinically relevant structures; interactive speed; and the ability to manipulate the visualized structures for the simulation of surgical procedures. We have developed an efficient hardware, software, and application environment that fulfills these requirements and have initiated testing of its performance.