Method and device for loading medical appliance with medicaments and/or polymers

Abstract

A method and a device for loading a medical appliance with a medicament and/or polymer includes capturing images of a plurality of grooves or holes of the medical appliance using an image capturing device; performing digital image processing on the image of each of the grooves or holes to obtain a pattern of each of the grooves or holes; calculating a central position of the pattern of each of the grooves or holes, and determining a loading position of each of the grooves or holes based on the central position; and adjusting a relative position between a loading device and the medical appliance to align an outlet of the loading device with the loading position of the medical appliance, and loading each of the grooves or holes with the medicament and/or polymer. The method and device can load the medical appliance with the medicament and/or polymer fast and efficiently.

1 . A device for loading a medial appliance with a medicament and/or polymer, the medical appliance containing a plurality of grooves or holes, characterized in comprising:
 a platform for placing the medical appliance;   an image capturing device disposed above the platform for capturing images of the grooves or holes of the medical appliance;   an image processing unit connected with the image capturing device for performing digital image processing on the images of the grooves or holes captured by the image capturing device;   a position calculating unit connected with the image processing unit for calculating a desired relative position based on a result processed by the image processing unit;   a memory unit connected with the position calculating unit for recording a relative position calculated by the position calculating unit;   a first position adjustment device connected with the memory unit and with the platform for moving the platform based on the relative position in the memory unit to adjust a relative position relation between the medical appliance and the image capturing device and/or the loading device; and   
       a loading device disposed above the platform for loading the grooves or holes of the medical appliance with the medicament and/or polymer,
 characterized in that the image processing unit comprises: 
 an image converting sub-unit for converting the image of the groove or hole into a set of pixel points; 
 an image pre-processing sub-unit for performing a filter processing on the set of pixel points to remove image noise; and 
 an image processing sub-unit for processing the pre-processed image with a binary method to obtain the pattern of each of the grooves or holes, and 
 characterized in that the image processing sub-unit assigns a value to each of the pixel points with the binary method based on a gray value of each of the pre-processed pixel points, designates a pixel point conforming with a preset value or a value range as a target pixel point or a background pixel point, and connects all the pixel points designated as the target pixel points or the background pixel points to obtain the patterns of the grooves or holes. 
 
     
     
         2 . The device according to  claim 1 , characterized in further comprising a position calibration device connected with the memory unit for calibrating a spatial position relation between a central position of the image capturing device and an outlet of the loading device, and
 the platform comprises a rotation platform and a stent shaft, the stent shaft fixed in and penetrated through the middle of the rotation platform, and the medical appliance disposed on the stent shaft.   
     
     
         3 . The device according to  claim 2 , characterized in further comprising:
 a second position adjustment device connected with the memory unit and with the image capturing device for driving the image capturing device to move in a horizontal coordinate plane based on the relative position in the memory unit; and   a third position adjustment device connected with the memory unit and with the loading device for driving the loading device to move in a horizontal plane based on the relative position in the memory unit,   wherein an axes of the image capturing device and an axis of the loading device are disposed in the same vertical plane.