Systems and methods for medical intervention

Abstract

One embodiment is directed to an elongate instrument navigation system for conducting a medical procedure on a patient, comprising: an elongate instrument comprising an elongate body coupled to two or more discretely positioned magnetic steering nodes, the elongate instrument comprising an insertion length selected such that a distal portion may be inserted to reach a position of a targeted interventional structure within the body of the patient, and a cross-sectional size profile configured to be navigated through one or more tissue structures of the patient as the patient is positioned in an operating environment which may be characterized by a global coordinate system; a computing system operatively coupled to the elongate instrument and configured to present a control interface to an operator; and two or more magnetic field sources, each of which is controllably movably coupled relative to the patient by a robotic coupling assembly operatively coupled to the computing system; wherein in response to commands provided by the operator to the computing system, the computing system is configured to precisely navigate a portion of the elongate body of the elongate instrument relative to the one or more tissue structures of the patient by causing each of the two or more magnetic field sources to be positioned and oriented relative to the patient and relative to the two or more magnetic steering nodes of the elongate instrument using each of the robotic coupling assemblies.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.