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In the field of computer- and robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery, enormous progress has been made in recent years based on the recognition of surgical instruments in endoscopic images. Especially the determination of the position and type of the instruments is of great interest here. Current work involves both spatial and temporal information with the idea, that the prediction of movement of surgical tools over time may improve the quality of final segmentations. The provision of publicly available datasets has recently encouraged the development of new methods, mainly based on deep learning. In this review, we identify datasets used for method development and evaluation, as well as quantify their frequency of use in the literature. We further present an overview of the current state of research regarding the segmentation and tracking of minimally invasive surgical instruments in endoscopic images. The paper focuses on methods that work purely visually without attached markers of any kind on the instruments, taking into account both single-frame segmentation approaches as well as those involving temporal information. A discussion of the reviewed literature is provided, highlighting existing shortcomings and emphasizing available potential for future developments. The publications considered were identified through the platforms Google Scholar, Web of Science, and PubMed. The search terms used were "instrument segmentation", "instrument tracking", "surgical tool segmentation", and "surgical tool tracking" and result in 408 articles published between 2015 and 2022 from which 109 were included using systematic selection criteria.
Heavy smoke development represents an important challenge for operating physicians during laparoscopic procedures and can potentially affect the success of an intervention due to reduced visibility and orientation. Reliable and accurate recognition of smoke is therefore a prerequisite for the use of downstream systems such as automated smoke evacuation systems. Current approaches distinguish between non-smoked and smoked frames but often ignore the temporal context inherent in endoscopic video data. In this work, we therefore present a method that utilizes the pixel-wise displacement from randomly sampled images to the preceding frames determined using the optical flow algorithm by providing the transformed magnitude of the displacement as an additional input to the network. Further, we incorporate the temporal context at evaluation time by applying an exponential moving average on the estimated class probabilities of the model output to obtain more stable and robust results over time. We evaluate our method on two convolutional-based and one state-of-the-art transformer architecture and show improvements in the classification results over a baseline approach, regardless of the network used.
Real-time computational speed and a high degree of precision are requirements for computer-assisted interventions. Applying a segmentation network to a medical video processing task can introduce significant inter-frame prediction noise. Existing approaches can reduce inconsistencies by including temporal information but often impose requirements on the architecture or dataset. This paper proposes a method to include temporal information in any segmentation model and, thus, a technique to improve video segmentation performance without alterations during training or additional labeling. With Motion-Corrected Moving Average, we refine the exponential moving average between the current and previous predictions. Using optical flow to estimate the movement between consecutive frames, we can shift the prior term in the moving-average calculation to align with the geometry of the current frame. The optical flow calculation does not require the output of the model and can therefore be performed in parallel, leading to no significant runtime penalty for our approach. We evaluate our approach on two publicly available segmentation datasets and two proprietary endoscopic datasets and show improvements over a baseline approach.
In the field of computer- and robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery, enormous progress has been made in recent years based on the recognition of surgical instruments in endoscopic images and videos. In particular, the determination of the position and type of instruments is of great interest. Current work involves both spatial and temporal information, with the idea that predicting the movement of surgical tools over time may improve the quality of the final segmentations. The provision of publicly available datasets has recently encouraged the development of new methods, mainly based on deep learning. In this review, we identify and characterize datasets used for method development and evaluation and quantify their frequency of use in the literature. We further present an overview of the current state of research regarding the segmentation and tracking of minimally invasive surgical instruments in endoscopic images and videos. The paper focuses on methods that work purely visually, without markers of any kind attached to the instruments, considering both single-frame semantic and instance segmentation approaches, as well as those that incorporate temporal information. The publications analyzed were identified through the platforms Google Scholar, Web of Science, and PubMed. The search terms used were “instrument segmentation”, “instrument tracking”, “surgical tool segmentation”, and “surgical tool tracking”, resulting in a total of 741 articles published between 01/2015 and 07/2023, of which 123 were included using systematic selection criteria. A discussion of the reviewed literature is provided, highlighting existing shortcomings and emphasizing the available potential for future developments.
Reliable recognition and localization of surgical instruments in endoscopic video recordings are foundational for a wide range of applications in computer- and robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery (RAMIS), including surgical training, skill assessment, and autonomous assistance. However, robust performance under real-world conditions remains a significant challenge. Incorporating surgical context - such as the current procedural phase - has emerged as a promising strategy to improve robustness and interpretability. To address these challenges, we organized the Surgical Procedure Phase, Keypoint, and Instrument Recognition (PhaKIR) sub-challenge as part of the Endoscopic Vision (EndoVis) challenge at MICCAI 2024. We introduced a novel, multi-center dataset comprising thirteen full-length laparoscopic cholecystectomy videos collected from three distinct medical institutions, with unified annotations for three interrelated tasks: surgical phase recognition, instrument keypoint estimation, and instrument instance segmentation. Unlike existing datasets, ours enables joint investigation of instrument localization and procedural context within the same data while supporting the integration of temporal information across entire procedures. We report results and findings in accordance with the BIAS guidelines for biomedical image analysis challenges. The PhaKIR sub-challenge advances the field by providing a unique benchmark for developing temporally aware, context-driven methods in RAMIS and offers a high-quality resource to support future research in surgical scene understanding.
Hintergrund: Die Entwicklung assistiver Technologien wird in den kommenden Jahren nicht nur in der Chirurgie von zunehmender Bedeutung sein. Die Wahrnehmung der Istsituation stellt hierbei die Grundlage jeder autonomen Handlung dar. Hierfür können unterschiedliche Sensorsysteme genutzt werden, wobei videobasierte Systeme ein besonderes Potenzial aufweisen.
Methode: Anhand von Literaturangaben und auf Basis eigener Forschungsarbeiten werden zentrale Aspekte bildbasierter Unterstützungssysteme für die Chirurgie dargestellt. Hierbei wird deren Potenzial, aber auch die Limitationen der Methoden erläutert.
Ergebnisse: Eine etablierte Anwendung stellt die Phasendetektion chirurgischer Eingriffe dar, für die Operationsvideos mittels neuronaler Netzwerke analysiert werden. Durch eine zeitlich gestützte und transformative Analyse konnten die Ergebnisse der Prädiktion jüngst deutlich verbessert werden. Aber auch robotische Kameraführungssysteme nutzen Bilddaten, um das Laparoskop zukünftig autonom zu navigieren. Um die Zuverlässigkeit an die hohen Anforderungen in der Chirurgie anzugleichen, müssen diese jedoch durch zusätzliche Informationen ergänzt werden. Ein vergleichbarer multimodaler Ansatz wurde bereits für die Navigation und Lokalisation bei laparoskopischen Eingriffen umgesetzt. Hierzu werden Videodaten mittels verschiedener Methoden analysiert und diese Ergebnisse mit anderen Sensormodalitäten fusioniert.
Diskussion: Bildbasierte Unterstützungsmethoden sind bereits für diverse Aufgaben verfügbar und stellen einen wichtigen Aspekt für die Chirurgie der Zukunft dar. Um hier jedoch zuverlässig und für autonome Funktionen eingesetzt werden zu können, müssen sie zukünftig in multimodale Ansätze eingebettet werden, um die erforderliche Sicherheit bieten zu können.
Aims
AI has proven great potential in assisting endoscopists in diagnostics, however its role in therapeutic endoscopy remains unclear. Endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) is a technically demanding intervention with a slow learning curve and relevant risks like bleeding and perforation. Therefore, we aimed to develop an algorithm for the real-time detection and delineation of relevant structures during third-space endoscopy.
Methods
5470 still images from 59 full length videos (47 ESD, 12 POEM) were annotated. 179681 additional unlabeled images were added to the training dataset. Consequently, a DeepLabv3+ neural network architecture was trained with the ECMT semi-supervised algorithm (under review elsewhere). Evaluation of vessel detection was performed on a dataset of 101 standardized video clips from 15 separate third-space endoscopy videos with 200 predefined blood vessels.
Results
Internal validation yielded an overall mean Dice score of 85% (68% for blood vessels, 86% for submucosal layer, 88% for muscle layer). On the video test data, the overall vessel detection rate (VDR) was 94% (96% for ESD, 74% for POEM). The median overall vessel detection time (VDT) was 0.32 sec (0.3 sec for ESD, 0.62 sec for POEM).
Conclusions
Evaluation of the developed algorithm on a video test dataset showed high VDR and quick VDT, especially for ESD. Further research will focus on a possible clinical benefit of the AI application for VDR and VDT during third-space endoscopy.
This data article describes the Surgical Procedure Phase, Keypoint, and Instrument Recognition (PhaKIR) dataset, a collection of eight complete laparoscopic cholecystectomy videos acquired during routine minimally invasive procedures at three German medical centers. The recordings were captured with different monocular endoscopic camera systems at 25 frames per second and a resolution of 1920 × 1080 pixels, with durations ranging from 28 to 58 minutes. Segments showing regions outside the abdominal cavity were removed for anonymization, and the corresponding cut indices are provided.
The dataset offers unified annotations for three interrelated tasks on the same complete surgical sequences: surgical phase recognition, annotated for every frame at 25 fps (485,875 frames), instrument keypoint estimation (19,435 frames), and instrument instance segmentation (19,435 frames), each annotated at one frame per second (every 25th frame). Surgical phases follow the seven-phase Cholec80 scheme, extended by an undefined label for transitional frames. The instrument annotations distinguish 19 instrument classes as well as individual instances of the same class, with keypoint annotations comprising two to four class-dependent points labeled with COCO-style visibility states. Segmentation and keypoint labels were created manually using the Computer Vision Annotation Tool (CVAT), whereas phase labels were derived from documented phase-transition timestamps, and all annotations underwent a multi-stage review by a medically trained team. The data are provided in open formats (MP4, CSV, JSON, PNG) together with a frame-extraction script under the CC BY-NC-SA license and are available through controlled access upon request via the Zenodo platform.
Because the dataset combines procedural context, instrument pose, and pixel-accurate instance segmentations within full-length recordings from multiple institutions, it can be reused for single-task or multi-task model development, for temporally aware approaches that exploit motion continuity, and for cross-institutional generalization protocols such as leave-one-hospital-out evaluation. The dataset served as the training resource for the PhaKIR Challenge at the Endoscopic Vision (EndoVis) Challenge at MICCAI 2024.
The endoscopic features associated with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) may be missed during routine endoscopy. We aimed to develop and evaluate an Artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithm for detecting and quantifying the endoscopic features of EoE in white light images, supplemented by the EoE Endoscopic Reference Score (EREFS). An AI algorithm (AI-EoE) was constructed and trained to differentiate between EoE and normal esophagus using endoscopic white light images extracted from the database of the University Hospital Augsburg. In addition to binary classification, a second algorithm was trained with specific auxiliary branches for each EREFS feature (AI-EoE-EREFS). The AI algorithms were evaluated on an external data set from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (UNC), and compared with the performance of human endoscopists with varying levels of experience. The overall sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of AI-EoE were 0.93 for all measures, while the AUC was 0.986. With additional auxiliary branches for the EREFS categories, the AI algorithm (AI-EoEEREFS) performance improved to 0.96, 0.94, 0.95, and 0.992 for sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, and AUC, respectively. AI-EoE and AI-EoE-EREFS performed significantly better than endoscopy beginners and senior fellows on the same set of images. An AI algorithm can be trained to detect and quantify endoscopic features of EoE with excellent performance scores. The addition of the EREFS criteria improved the performance of the AI algorithm, which performed significantly better than endoscopists with a lower or medium experience level.
