Development of a Drawing Application for Communication Support during Endoscopic Surgery and Its Evaluation Using Steering Law

The purpose of this study is to construct a hands-free endoscopic surgical communication support system that can draw lines in space corresponding to head movements using AR technology and evaluate the applicability of the drawing motion by the head movement to the steering law, one of the HCI models, for the potential use during endoscopic surgery. In the experiment, the participants manipulated the cursor by using head movements through the pathway and movement time (MT); the number of errors and subjective evaluation of the difficulty of the task was obtained. The results showed that the head-movement-based line drawing manipulation was significantly affected by the tracking direction and by the task difficulty, shown as the Index of Difficulty (ID). There was high linearity between ID and MT, with a coefficient of determination R2 of 0.9991. The Index of Performance was higher in the horizontal and vertical directions compared to diagonal directions. Although the weight and biocompatibility of the AR glasses must be overcome to make the current prototype a viable tool for supporting communication in the operating room environment, the prototype has the potential to promote the development of a computer-supported collaborative work environment for endoscopic surgery purposes.