One of the most promising applications of Optical See-Through Augmented Reality is minimally laparoscopic surgery, which currently suffers from problems such as surgeon discomfort and fatigue caused by looking at a display positioned outside the surgeon’s visual field, made worse by the length of the procedure. This fatigue is especially felt on the surgeon’s neck, as it is strained from adopting unnatural postures in order to visualise the laparoscopic video feed. Throughout this paper, we will present work in Augmented Reality, as well as developments in surgery and Augmented Reality applied to both surgery in general and laparoscopy in particular to address these issues. We applied user and task analysis methods to learn about practices performed in the operating room by observing surgeons in their working environment in order to understand, in detail, how they performed their tasks and achieved their intended goals. Drawing on observations and analysis of video recordings of laparoscopic surgeries, we identified relevant constraints and design requirements. Besides proposals to approach the ergonomic issues, we present a design and implementation of a multimodal interface to enhance the laparoscopic procedure. Our method makes it more comfortable for surgeons by allowing them to keep the laparoscopic video in their viewing area regardless of neck posture. Also, our interface makes it possible to access patient imaging data without interrupting the operation. It also makes it possible to communicate with team members through a pointing reticle. We evaluated how surgeons perceived the implemented prototype, in terms of usefulness and usability, via a think-aloud protocol to conduct qualitative evaluation sessions which we describe in detail in this paper. In addition to checking the advantages of the prototype as compared to traditional laparoscopic settings, we also conducted a System Usability Scale questionnaire for measuring its usability, and a NASA Task Load Index questionnaire to rate perceived workload and to assess the prototype effectiveness. Our results show that surgeons consider that our prototype can improve surgeon-to-surgeon communication using head pose as a means of pointing. Also, surgeons believe that our approach can afford a more comfortable posture throughout the surgery and enhance hand-eye coordination, as physicians no longer need to twist their necks to look at screens placed outside the field of operation.

光学穿透式增强现实技术最有希望的应用之一是最小化腹腔镜手术，目前腹腔镜手术存在着诸如外科医生不适感和疲劳感等问题，这些问题是由于观看位于外科医生视野之外的显示器而引起的，由于手术时间的延长，这种情况变得更糟。这种疲劳在外科医生的脖子上尤为明显，因为它采用了不自然的姿势来使腹腔镜视频输入可视化。在整篇文章中，我们将介绍增强现实技术的工作以及外科和增强现实技术在一般外科手术和腹腔镜手术中的发展，尤其是解决这些问题的方法。我们应用了用户和任务分析方法，通过观察外科医生的工作环境来了解在手术室中执行的操作，以了解，详细地讲，他们如何执行任务并实现预期目标。根据对腹腔镜手术录像的观察和分析，我们确定了相关的限制条件和设计要求。除了解决人体工程学问题的建议外，我们还提出了一种多模态界面的设计和实现，以增强腹腔镜检查程序。我们的方法使外科医生无论颈部姿势如何都可以将腹腔镜视频保持在他们的视线范围内，从而使外科医生更加舒适。此外，我们的界面还可以在不中断操作的情况下访问患者影像数据。还可以通过指示标线与团队成员进行交流。我们从实用性和可用性方面评估了外科医生如何看待已实施的原型，通过“思考型”协议进行定性评估会议，我们将在本文中详细介绍。除了检查原型与传统腹腔镜设置相比的优势外，我们还进行了系统可用性量表以测量其可用性，并进行了NASA任务负荷指数问卷以评估感知的工作量并评估原型的有效性。我们的结果表明，外科医生认为我们的原型可以使用头部姿势作为指示手段来改善外科医生之间的交流。而且，外科医生认为，由于医生不再需要扭动脖子去看手术区域外的屏幕，我们的方法可以在整个手术过程中提供更舒适的姿势并增强手眼协调性。