Shockwave simulation in electrohydrolic lithotripsy and wave performance optimization

Abstract

Lithotripsy systems are commonly used to break kidney stones into fragments. Nowadays these systems are also used in orthopedic operations. There are several ongoing investigational studies on lithotripsy systems in the treatment of cancer and cardiovascular diseases. Because of these new application areas we need novel lithotripter designs for different kinds of treatment strategies. The best way to reduce design time and cost is to create a computational model of the lithotripsy system. In this study the finite difference time domain (FDTD) method were used while constructing the computational model of the lithotripsy system. While implementing the model, most of the physical system parameters were defined as an input and/or as a variable in the simulations. We tested several realistic parameters used in the simulations and compared the results with the expected outcomes and optimized our system accordingly. Finally, we studied the effects of changing the input parameters like ellipsoide reflector size, and focus point misalignment. In conclusion, to reduce design costs in various medical applications that use shockwave principle this computer-based simulation platform may be suitable.