MINI REVIEW article
Front. Med.
Sec. Translational Medicine
This article is part of the Research Topic25 Years of 21st Century MedicineView all 32 articles
Precision Surgery in the Era of 3D Visualization, AR/VR, and 3D Printing: Current Applications and Future Directions
Provisionally accepted
- Affiliated Hospital of Hebei University, Baoding, China
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The advancement of precision surgery demands increased operative accuracy, underscoring the growing importance of three-dimensional (3D) visualization technology as a key tool for overcoming the limitations of two-dimensional (2D) imaging. Over the past decade, this technology has evolved from a post-processing tool into an integrated intelligent platform spanning the entire surgical workflow: preoperative assessment, surgical planning, intraoperative navigation, postoperative follow-up, and teaching/training. This report comprehensively reviews the current applications and key advances of 3D reconstruction, 3D printing, augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), and mixed reality (MR) technologies across major general surgery subspecialties. These include hepatobiliary, pancreatic, gastrointestinal, thyroid/breast, hernia/abdominal wall, organ transplantation, and pediatric surgery. Through in-depth analysis, the review elucidates how these technologies facilitate precision surgery, objectively assesses current technical limitations and ethical/regulatory challenges, and explores future directions driven by artificial intelligence (AI), 5G/6G telecommunications, and digital twin technology.
Keywords: 3D printing, 3D visualization, augmented reality, General Surgery, precision surgery, virtual reality
Received: 19 Aug 2025; Accepted: 16 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Ren, Xie, Jin, Liu, Liu and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Meng Zhang
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