ACTA SCIENTIFIC DENTAL SCIENCES (ISSN: 2581-4893) Volume 3 Issue 10 October 2019 Applying Waterjet Technology in Surgical Procedures Abdou George* and Atalla Nadi Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, New Jersey, USA *Corresponding Author: Abdou George, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, New Jersey, USA. Review Article Received: August 16, 2019; Published: September 27, 2019 Abstract Keywords: Waterjet; Surgery; Skin; Incision The main objective of the paper is to predict the optimal waterjet pressure required to cut, drill or debride the skin layers without causing any damages to the organs. A relationship between the waterjet pressure and skin thickness has been established. It also includes the modulus of elasticity of the skin, the diameter of nozzle orifice, the nozzle standoff distance and the traverse speed of the waterjet as well as the duration of applying the waterjet pressure. Thus, practical relationship between waterjet operating pa- rameters and the physical properties of the skin has been formulated. A real Caesarean section procedure data has been applied to the formulation. Given the Ultimate Tensile Strength of the skin at the abdomen to be 20 MPa, incision parameters of 18 mm deep, 12 cm long and 0.4 mm wide, applying a traverse speed of 0.5 mm/s and stand-off distance of 5 mm, the resulted waterjet pressure is 17.89 MPa using a 0.4 mm orifice diameter. Introduction Waterjet technology has been used in several applications such as industrial cutting, drilling and cleaning. Furthermore, water- jet technology can also be used in the medical field; applications of this include dentistry, wound cleaning and other surgical op- erations. Over the years, waterjet techniques have been developed into a revolutionary cutting tool in variety types of surgery [1]. It can be used in precision cutting of skin for any type of surgery. The tool would simply be moved in a line to apply the pressure and the cut. The main advantage of waterjet incision is its precision; it is as effective as a laser cutter. However, the waterjet incision does not cause any thermal damage to the separated tissue due to its cool- ant ability. Additionally, the waterjet also washes away blood which eliminates any extra tools to do this which would be required in a regular cut [2]. In vivo and in vitro experiments on patients and animals have been conducted with continuous waterjet at different low pres- sures. However, few studies have focused on the skin. Further analyses on the relationship among the operating parameters of waterjet, structure, and mechanical properties of the skin must be conducted. Literature Review The waterjet technology is currently used for cutting a wide range of materials. The main advantages of this technology include the lack of thermal effect on the material being cut. While waterjet is applied to all kinds of industries, only the medical field will be highlighted. Table 1 summarizes some of the applications of wa- terjet cutting in the medical field. The performance of waterjet machining process is dependent on the water pressure of the jet and the elastic properties of the skin. The initial impact is considered to be the highest impact; it can be achieved when the waterjet hits the tissue. After that, the water starts flowing radially and the impact of the jet decreases [4]. DOI: 10.31080/ASDS.2019.03.0658 Citation: Abdou George and Atalla Nadi. “Applying Waterjet Technology in Surgical Procedures”. Acta Scientific Dental Sciences 3.10 (2019): 108-114.