Medical endoscopy constitutes a basic device for the development of minimally invasive procedures for a wide range ofmedical applications, involving diagnosis, treatment and surgery, as well as biopsy sampling. Its minimally invasivenature results in no surgery, or only small incisions, which involves a minimal hospitalization time. The medicalrelevance of endoscopes relies on the fact that they are one of the most effective means of early stages of cancerdiagnosis, with the subsequent improvement in the patient's quality of life. Flexible endoscopy by means of coherentoptical fiber bundles shows both flexibility and a high active area. However, the parallel arrangement of the fibers withinthe bundle produces interference phenomena between them, which results in optical crosstalk. As a consequence, there isa power exchange between contiguous fibers, producing a worsening in the contrast of the image. In this work, thisquality limiting factor is deeply studied. We quantitatively analyze crosstalk, performing several studies that show thelimitations imposed to the endoscopic system. Finally, we propose some solutions by an analytical method to accuratelydetermine the appropriate optical fibers for each particular design. The method is also applied to endoscopic OCT.
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