Prediction of bone grinding temperature in skull base neurosurgery

Abstract

This study investigates the bone grinding temperature in skull base neurosurgery and develops a skull thermal model to visualize the thermal injury to cranial nerves. Patients suffering from brain cancer in the skull base often require radical surgical resection of the tumor using the miniature ball-end diamond wheel to grind the bone for identifying and preserving the nerve. An inverse heat transfer method is developed and quantifies the grinding thermal power of 0.4–0.5W, which can raise the bone temperature by over 20°C. A thermal analysis on a skull model is also demonstrated based on this heat generation.