• Dinges, Christian
• Vötsch, Andreas
• Hergan, Klaus
• Scharinger, Bernhard
• Meissnitzer, Matthias
• Deutschmann, Michael
• Kaufmann, Reinhard
• Hecht, Stefan

Abstract

<jats:p>Three-dimensional (3D)-printed vascular models for cardiovascular surgery planning and endovascular procedure simulations often lack realistic biological tissues mim¬icking material properties, including flexibility or transparency, or both. Transparent silicone or silicone-like vascular models were not available for end-user 3D printers and had to be fabricated using complex and cost-intensive workarounds. This limita¬tion has now been overcome by novel liquid resins with biological tissue properties. These new materials enable simple and low-cost fabrication of transparent and flexi¬ble vascular models using end-user stereolithography 3D printers and are promising technological advances toward more realistic patient-specific, radiation-free proce¬dure simulations and planning in cardiovascular surgery and interventional radiol¬ogy. This paper presents our patient-specific manufacturing process of fabricating transparent and flexible vascular models using freely available open-source software for segmentation and 3D post-processing, aiming to facilitate the integration of 3D printing into clinical care.</jats:p>

Topics

• simulation
• resin