Method and apparatus for distal targeting of locking screws in intramedullary nails

1. A system for aligning a drill bushing with a transverse hole in an intramedullary nail, the system comprising:

a probe having an elongated member with a distal end,

a first permanent magnet that is polarized along its longitudinal axis that is mounted perpendicularly to the distal end of the elongated member;

a second permanent magnet polarized along its longitudinal axis and mounted about the elongated member a predetermined distance away from the first permanent magnet, the second permanent magnet being oriented about the elongated member so that its longitudinal axis is parallel to the longitudinal axis of the first magnet;

a targeting array of magnetic sensors, each magnetic sensor in the targeting array being arranged in a single plane, each magnetic sensor in the targeting array being configured to generate magnetic flux density measurements of a magnetic field of the first permanent magnet, each magnetic sensor in the targeting array has at least one corresponding sensor in the array that indicates a balance condition when the magnetic sensor and its corresponding magnetic sensor generate magnetic flux density measurements that are approximately equal; and

an alignment sensor spaced apart from the targeting array by approximately the predetermined distance, the alignment sensor being configured to generate magnetic flux density measurements of a magnetic field of the second permanent magnet, the predetermined distance enabling the alignment sensor to measure the magnetic flux density of the magnetic field of the second permanent magnet without the magnetic flux density measurements being affected by the magnetic field of the first permanent magnet.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the magnetic sensors are Hall effect sensors.

3. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

a positioning jig for fixing a position of the elongated member within an intramedullary nail so the first permanent magnet is proximate a transverse hole of the intramedullary nail.

4. The system of claim 1 , the targeting array further comprising:

sixteen magnetic sensors arranged about a drill bushing centrally located within the sixteen magnetic sensor arrangement.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the predetermined distance is a distance at least thee times greater than a greatest dimension of the first and the second permanent magnets.

6. The system of claim 5 , the targeting array comprising:

seventeen magnetic sensors with sixteen of the magnetic sensors being arranged about the seventeenth magnetic sensor that is centrally located within the sixteen magnetic sensors.

7. The system of claim 6 , the targeting array comprising:

five of the magnetic sensors being three channel magnetic sensors for measuring magnetic flux density in three orthogonal axes.

8. The system of claim 7 , the targeting array comprising:

twelve of the magnetic sensors being one channel only magnetic sensors for measuring magnetic flux density in only one axis of a three orthogonal axis system.

9. The system of claim 7 wherein one of the five magnetic sensors that are three channel sensors is centrally positioned within and equidistant from the other four of the five magnetic sensors.

10. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

a display for indicating targeting array position with respect to the first permanent magnet at the distal end of the probe.

11. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

a background magnetic sensor for measuring background magnetic fields so the background magnetic field measurements are removed from the measurements made with the targeting array.