The influence of stents on the performance of an ultrasonic navigation system for endovascular procedures.

Objective: Image-guided surgery provides a mechanism to accurately and quickly assess the location of surgical tools relative to a preoperative image. Traditional image-guided surgery relies on infrared or radiofrequency triangulation to determine an instrument location relative to a preoperative image and has been primarily used in head and neck procedures. Advances in ultrasonic tracking devices, designed for tracking catheters within vessels, may provide an opportunity for image-guided endovascular procedures.