The project ARNI ("Augmented Reality Needle Intervention") is funded by the German Ministry of Research and Education (BMBF).
ARNI started on 01.01.2019 and originally had a duration of 30 months, but could be extended by 12 months until 30.06.2022.
The project parties are:
- Medical partner: Clinic for children and adolescents medicine, University Hospital Frankfurt am Main
- Scientific partner: Medical Engineering Laboratory (MEL), Westphalian University of Applied Sciences Gelsenkirchen
- Project coordinator: SomaView GmbH
In paediatric emergency care establishing intravenous lines (IVs) are one of the most basic skills but can be challenging due to the particular situation of young patients: small vessels, agitated patients and nervous parents often complicate the situation. Ultrasound (US) support has proven to be very helpful in these challenging cases.
ARNI supports physicians during vascular needle interventions by visualizing all relevant information for the intervention at the site of the event/procedure. There is no need for a constant change of view between the monitor of the ultrasound device and the site of the intervention.
Further developments deal with the integration of ARNI in combined AR and VR environments (mixed reality) in order to give remote experts the possibility to be virtually present during the intervention. A combination of ARNI with a 3D scanner such as the Microsoft Kinect allows virtual work in volumetric environments.
The following scientific publications have been published so far in Project ARNI:
- Augmented-Reality-based Needle Interventions with Hololens, BMT 2020
- Wireless augmented reality point of care ultrasound, POCUS Conference 2021
- Genauigkeitsuntersuchung für ein AR-basiertes Nadelinterventions-System, CURAC 2021
- A Combination of Wireless Point of Care Ultrasound and Augmented Reality on Hololens 2, BMT 2021
- Augmented reality ultrasound support for intravenous lines in paediatric emergency care, Jahrestagung Pädiatrie Schweiz 2022
- A mixed reality telemedicine system for collaborative ultrasound diagnostics and ultrasound-guided interventions, AboutOpen Vol.9, 2022
- Impact of PCA-based preprocessing and different CNN structures on deformable registration of sonograms, WSCG 2022