Flexible Bronchoscope

Rigid bronchoscopy, which usually requires general anesthesia and some risk of damage to airways or vocal cords, can be quite distressing to the patient, and even more so if the scope cannot reach the region of interest.  Fiber optic bronchoscopes are less troublesome in these regards, but Spanish biomedical engineers have created a CT-based “virtual bronchoscope” that, in showing a lesion is inaccessible, could eliminate an unnecessary procedure, or, alternatively, map the most effective route for scoping.  MORE

Image Credit: Institute of Industrial and Control Engineering (IOC) of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), Spain, and the Pulmonology Research Group of the Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL), Catalonia