Interactive teaching environment for diagnostic radiography with real-time X-ray simulation and patient positioning
Written by: Aaron Sujar, Graham Kelly, Marcos Garcia, and Franck P. Vidal
Published on: Summary
Purpose
Traditional undergraduate radiographer training mixes academic lectures and clinical practice. Our goal is to bridge the current disconnection between theory and practice in a safe environment, avoiding the risk of radiation for both practitioners and patients. To this end, this research proposes a new software to teach diagnostic radiography using real-time interactive X-ray simulation and patient positioning.
Methods
The proposed medical simulator is composed of three main modules. A fast and accurate character animation technique is in charge of simulating the patient positioning phase and adapts their internal anatomy accordingly. gVirtualXRay is an open-source X-ray simulation library and generates the corresponding radiographs in real time. Finally, the courseware allows going through all the diagnostic radiology steps from the patient positioning and the machine configuration to the final image enhancing.
Results
A face and content validation study has been conducted; 18 radiology professionals were recruited to evaluate our software using a questionnaire. The results show that our tool is realistic in many ways (72% of the participants agreed that the simulations are visually realistic), useful (67%) and suitable (78%) for teaching X-ray radiography.
Conclusions
The proposed tool allows simulating the most relevant steps of the projectional radiography procedure. The virtual patient posing system and X-ray simulation module execute at interactive rates. These features enable the lectures to show their students the results of good and bad practices in a classroom environment, avoiding radiation risk.
Awards
3rd place - Vidal, F. P., Afshari, S., Albiol, A., Albiol, F., Bellot, A., Brun, A. L., Chou, C.-Y., Desbarats, P., García, M., Giovannelli, J.-F., Hatton, C., Henry, A., Kelly, G., Michelet, C., Mihail, R. P., Racy, M., Rouwane, A., Seznec, H., Sújar, A., Tugwell-Allsup, J., and Villard, P.-F.: "X-ray simulations with gVirtualXray in medicine and life sciences". Dirk Bartz Prize for Visual Computing in Medicine and Life Sciences 2025 (Eurographics Medical Prize).
Winner of David Duce Prize for best short paper - Sujar, A., Kelly, G., Garcia, M., & Vidal, F.P.: "Projectional Radiography Simulator: an Interactive Teaching Tool". Computer Graphics and Visual Computing 2019 (CGVC 2019). DOI: 10.2312/cgvc.20191267
Publications
- Vidal, F. P., Afshari, S., Albiol, A., Albiol, F., Bellot, A., Brun, A. L., Chou, C.-Y., Desbarats, P., García, M., Giovannelli, J.-F., Hatton, C., Henry, A., Kelly, G., Michelet, C., Mihail, R. P., Racy, M., Rouwane, A., Seznec, H., Sújar, A., Tugwell-Allsup, J., and Villard, P.-F. (2025). Meuschke, M. & Kuhlen, T. W. (Eds.). “X-ray simulations with gVirtualXray in medicine and life sciences”. Dirk Bartz Prize for Visual Computing in Medicine and Life Sciences 2025 (Eurographics Medical Prize). DOI: 10.2312/evm.20251974
- Sújar, A., Kelly, G., García, M., & Vidal, F. P. (2021). Interactive teaching environment for diagnostic radiography with real-time X-ray simulation and patient positioning. International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery 17, 85–95. doi:10.1007/s11548-021-02499-7
- Sújar, A., Kelly, G., García, M., & Vidal, F. P. (2019). Tam, G. K. L., & Roberts, J. C. (Eds.). Projectional radiography simulator: an interactive teaching tool. Computer Graphics and Visual Computing (CGVC) (pp. 125–128). The Eurographics Association. doi:10.2312/cgvc.20191267
Dissertation
Sújar Garrido, A. (2019). Subject posing in patient specific simulators (Doctoral dissertation). Universitad Rey Juan Carlos, Madrid, Spain.
Citations
@INPROCEEDINGS{Vidal2025DirkBartz,
author = {F. P. Vidal and S. Afshari and A. Albiol and F. Albiol and
A. Corb\'i Bellot and A. L. Brun and C.-Y. Chou and P. Desbarats and
M. Garc\'ia and J.-F. Giovannelli and C. Hatton and A. Henry and
G. Kelly and C. Michelet and Radu P. Mihail M. Racy and A. Rouwane and
H. Seznec and A. S\'ujar and J. Tugwell-Allsup and P.-F. Villard},
booktitle = {Dirk Bartz Prize for Visual Computing in Medicine and Life Sciences 2025 (Eurographics Medical Prize)},
title = {{X-ray simulations with gVirtualXray in medicine and life sciences}},
year = 2025,
editor = {Monique Meuschke and Torsten W. Kuhlen},
publisher = {The Eurographics Association},
ISBN = {978-3-03868-281-3},
DOI = {10.2312/evm.20251974}
}
@article{Sujar2022,
title = {Interactive teaching environment for diagnostic radiography with real-time {X-ray} simulation and patient positioning},
author = {S{\'u}jar, Aaron and Kelly, Graham and Garc\'ia, Marcos and Franck P. Vidal},
doi = {10.1007/s11548-021-02499-7},
issn = {1861-6429},
journal = {International Journal of Computer Assisted Radiology and Surgery},
number = 17,
pages = {85-95},
month = jan,
year = 2022
}
@inproceedings {Sujar2019CGVC,
booktitle = {Computer Graphics and Visual Computing (CGVC)},
title = {Projectional Radiography Simulator: an Interactive Teaching Tool},
author = {Sujar, Aaron and Kelly, Graham and
Garc\'ia, Marcos and {\bf F.\,P. Vidal}},
year = 2019,
publisher = {The Eurographics Association},
note = {Winner of David Duce Prize for Best Short Paper},
pages = {125-128},
isbn = {978-3-03868-096-3},
doi = {10.2312/cgvc.20191267}
}
@PhDThesis{Sujar2019PhD,
author = {Aaron {S\'ujar Garrido}},
title = {Subject posing in patient specific simulators},
school = {Universitad Rey Juan Carlos},
address = {Madrid, Spain},
year = 2019,
}