Integrated 3D Body Scanner with Real-Time Compensation of Breathing Movement Artifacts

In the present work we introduce a new integrated body surface scanning system, especially thought for breast plastic and reconstructive surgery, made up by a programmable laser projector and a hand-held laser scanner, capable of acquiring and compensating patient breathing and involuntary movements through an optical tracking system, which is also needed to spatially localize the hand-held scanner. The programmable laser static projector is used to obtain a global but rough acquisition of patient surface, then the scanning is completed using the hand-held scanner through the scan of all hidden areas or filling the acquisition where is needed a higher detail description. The patient is fitted with a configuration of passive markers, which is used to detect patient movements at the same time of the acquisition of the laser spot projected by the “fixed” laser scanner or by the hand-held one. The use of an optical tracking system allows to obtain a real on-line compensation of the patient movements, and an automatic multiple patch connection (PCT Patent PCT/EP2009/009225). Our results show a perfect junction of different surface patches and a complete breathing and involuntary movement artifacts compensation, suggesting the presented methodology and instrumentation as a future complete solution for clinical body surface acquisition.