Touch screen devices are all pervasive. They have entered all spheres of our life. There aren’t many frontiers which the touch screen devices, especially Apple products haven’t yet conquered. Once such frontier is the emergency room. Looks like that’s taken over by iPod Touch in Breach Candy hospital, Mumbai. Doctors at Mumbai hospital have performed a knee surgery with the aid of iPod touch. An app called DASH was used as a help to perform the surgery. I am confused. How did iPod exactly help?
What exactly does the app and the iPod do?
DASH is a portable surgical navigation system (just like your GPS) which assists orthopedic surgeons in performing knee and hip joint procedures.
DASH provides greater accuracy in maneuvering hard to reach places by actually looking at the knee in the iPod in greater detail. Surgeons will be able to make finer adjustments by looking at the app and by not actually going to the operated knee.
The best thing about this process is, with a little training it can be used by any doctor across India or the world. All you need is a iPod or iPhone, an infrared camera (probably the expensive affair of the whole thing) and of course the app. The app is a 117 MB download but it comes loaded with instructional material and other things. It was designed in a way that it will work in stand alone manner and doesn’t depend on the connectivity.
The app provides videos on how to set-up the camera, how to attach femur array lateral, tibia cut and all those terms which only makes sense to a medical practitioner. Though there is a chance of misuse as the videos are educational and might fall into lesser qualified people, this sure will bring in a lot of accuracy into knee surgeries.
As you know, medical science isn’t an exact science. Efforts to make it as close to exact as possible should always be appreciated.
Only caveat : The medical bill might have this line item
iPod consulting fee : Rs. 12919
iOS royalty fee : Rs. 5216
Everyone might think that “look what iPod can do”. I say “look what apps can do”. Would it be a surprise then that there is a lot of slugfest going on in the app market, especially the Android one. And we by now know there is no real alternative to the iOS.
Watch the video here from OnlyGizmos :
Source, Image Via OnlyGizmos. App can be downloaded here.
