In this study, we assess the properties of the contact pressure applied by manually operated probes as a function of the operator, probe contact area, and sample stiffness. For this purpose, three different human skin-like phantoms with different well-defined mechanical properties were used. To gain relevant statistics of the contact pressure properties, the study included ten experienced probe operators that were asked to apply gentle contact pressure to the skin-like phantoms by using three different contact area probes. A novel system for rapid simultaneous acquisition of spectra and corresponding contact pressure was used to collect the relevant information. Results show that the variability of the gentle contact pressure significantly depends on the probe operator, sample stiffness and probe contact area.

Date Published: 12 March 2015
PDF: 6 pages
Proc. SPIE 9327, Optical Elastography and Tissue Biomechanics II, 932717 (12 March 2015); doi: 10.1117/12.2077190

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9327:
Optical Elastography and Tissue Biomechanics II
Kirill V. Larin; David D. Sampson, Editor(s)