Sensory system device for suture-manipulation tension measurement for surgery

In this paper, we describe a sensor-based device for suture-manipulation tension measurement for surgical purposes. The main purpose of this device is to protect the surgeon from applying the excessive force in making suture knots for any kind of surgery. This excessive tension might lead to skin rupture, tissue damage, and suture cut, etc. It is a simple device that can be used to train the new surgeons before working on real stitching on the human body, or used for future robotic system to perform delicate stitching and do plastic operations. We have used two-way visualization of suture tension using MATLAB GUI (tension vs. time) and LCD (numerical value-Newton) display on the device. The device is equipped with special phonic warning system using HCS12 microcontroller. When tension reaches to certain threshold (depends on the suture category), warning system starts alarming.