SAILOR: a 3-D medical simulator of loco-regional anaesthesia based on desktop virtual reality and pseudo-haptic feedback.

ABSTRACTAnaesthesia is a medical act which eliminates the feeling of pain as well as the motor reactions of a person, before performing a surgical operation. Loco-Regional Anaesthesia (LRA) concerns only a part of the body such as the front arm or leg. This practice is increasingly used today notably because the patient can remain conscious and can recover more rapidly. However, LRA still remains a risky procedure. In this paper, we introduce a novel medical simulator called SAILOR for the training for LRA with neurostimulation. SAILOR is based on desktop virtual reality, realistic 3-D rendering and interactive techniques with a classical mouse and keyboard. It simulates the various biological phenomena which can occur during an anaesthesia procedure. We also introduce a novel pseudo-haptic effect to enhance the palpation of the virtual patient's body and feel the inner organs. The first feedback from users of the commercialized DVD version of SAILOR as well as the results of pilot tests suggest that this simulator is a very promising tool for education and training for LRA.