Salient Features of Soft Tissue Examination Velocity during Manual Palpation

The direct access to organs during Robot-assisted Minimally Invasive Surgery (RMIS) is limited and palpation is difficult to be implemented. Therefore, there is a need for the development of advanced tactile instruments to be used for intra-operative soft tissue examination and accurate localization of abnormalities, such as tumours. Despite the availability of tactile devices for soft tissue examination [1], [2], the influence of probing behaviour on abnormality detection has not been studied yet. Our work underlines the importance of optimally chosen speed and load during tactile examination of the simulated viscoelastic environment [3]. In this work, we study the impact of velocity during manual palpation on the detection of hard inclusions in a silicone phantom and ex-vivo porcine kidney samples. In addition, validation results based on Finite Element (FE) simulations are presented. We present the evaluation of palpation velocity and show that it is a valuable source of information for the development of probing strategies and the design of new tactile sensing devices.