3D Printing Surgical Reference Models

During my undergrad I worked with Dr. Glenn Green and Dr. David Zopf who were very interested in the concept of customized medicine in their area of pediatric otolaryngology. I was able to help on some really cool cases where patients had a very difficult type of tumor which is often tightly embedded in their skull.

To minimize risk during the removal, a Dr. Zopf had the idea to take the CT scan, segment out the bone and the tumor then to print 1:1 scale versions.

I assisted by performing the segmentation of the structure from scan data, designing a mold for the tumor, printing the molds and skull, then casting a half dozen copies of the tumor in silicone. The surgeries I helped with were a success and the models were reported to be very helpful by the surgeons.

Article about the project. This focuses on the first test of this approach which I did not help on. I assisted in several subsequent cases where this was also very helpful.