3D Printing of Prototypes Starting from Medical Imaging: A Liver Case Study

Hepatic diseases are serious condition worldwide, and several times doctors analyse the situation and elaborates a preoperative planning based exclusively on the medical images, which are a drawback since they only provide a 2D vision and the location of the damaged tissues in the three-dimensional space cannot be easily determined by surgeons. Nowadays, with the advancement of Computer Aided Design (CAD) technologies and image segmentation, a digital liver model can be obtained to help understand the particular medical case; even with the geometric model, a virtual simulation can be elaborated. This work is divided into two phases; the first phase involves a workflow to create a liver geometrical model from medical images. Whereas the second phase provides a methodology to achieve liver prototype, using the technique of fused deposition modelling (FDM). The two stages determine and evaluate the most influencing parameters to make this design repeatable in different hepatic diseases. The reported case study provides a valuable method for optimizing preoperative plans for liver disease. In addition, the prototype built with additive manufacturing will allow the new doctors to speed up their learning curve, since they can manipulate the real geometry of the patient's liver with their hands.