Applicability of a single camera-based catheter navigation system using teeth arch as an anatomical landmark for superselective intraarterial infusion in advanced oral cancer treatment

Superselective intraarterial infusion chemoradiotherapy is a modality of oral cancer therapy in which the artery feeding the tumor is catheterized. 3D information about the carotid artery is required to enable the surgeon to judge whether to advance, retract, or rotate the catheter. For this purpose, we proposed and conducted a model experiment to assess a new method of catheterization that applies a tracking system using registration with a monocular camera using the maxillary arch as the anatomical landmark. In this method, the preoperative 3D computer tomography angiographic image of the carotid artery that the catheter will be passed through is overlaid on the 2D video image. The mean TRE was 0.96 ± 0.36 mm and 0.88 ± 0.31 mm and 1.12 ± 0.46 mm when images were registered with the anterior and posterior teeth as the landmarks, respectively; the difference was not significant ( p = 0.21). This tracking system that enables markerless registration simply by taking images of the maxillary anterior teeth with a single camera was convenient and effective for catheterization. In this study, we propose the new application of this tracking system and a novel method of catheterization for superselective intraarterial infusion chemoradiotherapy for oral cancer. Graphical abstract In retrograde superselective intraarterial catheterization, a catheter is inserted into a tumor-feeding artery originating from the external carotid artery (ECA) (the lingual artery [LA], facial artery [FA], or maxillary artery [MA]). Because the maxillary dentition is located near the external carotid artery, we focused on real-time markerless registration using maxillary dentition fixed to the skull.