METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR PRECISION LASER SURGERY

摘要

A system for effecting precision laser surgery includes an intensified surgical video microscope directed at the tissue to be operated upon and having zoom capability so that the camera may alternatively display easily recognizable landmarks with the option of enlarging, without the requirement of additional illumination or closer proximity to the target, any portion of the imaging field while still positioning the objective imaging lens at the same practical distance from the patient or tissues. The surgical microscope presents a microscopic image on a video screen in front of the surgeon. Views may be generated using Moire interferometry by projecting a Ronchi ruling on the surface of the tissue information for contour tracking of the subject surface. Interior elements and interfaces of, for example, the eye are also sensed by a light beam and precisely located and mapped by a computer forming a part of the device. The imaging system of the invention enables the surgeon to have before him abundant visual information on the video screen with indication of precisely where, in three dimensions, a focused surgical laser beam is directed at any time. Templates are generated from the experience of successful surgeries of the type contemplated, then surgeries are executed by accurately superposing, modifying the template to the particular needs and specifications required, and then activating the surgical templates, which will carry successive firings of the surgical laser in accordance with a precise programmed path determined by prior inspection and analysis assisted by the accumulated library of experience. The system also includes a real time tracking system for following the movements of the subject tissue, for example an eye during surgery.