Augmented Reality And Surgery
It seems like everywhere I turn, there is more evidence of how quickly things are moving. What was talked about years ago is suddenly appearing in the real world.
Does anyone remember Google Glass? This was suppose to be a revolutionary device that was going to change the world especially medicine.
Essentially, we were looking at glasses that utilized augmented reality. The premise was that people wearing the glasses would have access to information literally right before their eyes.
In the world of medicine, this would be extremely helpful. Doctors could have all of a patient's information. This would be helpful in surgery.
As we know, Google Glass was a failure. Like many technological innovations, it was ahead of its time.
That may no longer the case. Over the past 6 years, technology, especially augmented reality, has come a long way. We now could be ready to see surgery impacted by augmented reality.
Vuzix Corporation is a supplier of smart glasses and augmented reality technology. It recently announced that its Knee+ was used to complete a total knee replacement. The glasses displayed essential information in the field of view of the surgeon.
The surgery was done in partnership with Pixee Medical Company.
This is a rather new company that seeks to enhance surgeries and roll out the platform to other doctors.
The Pixee Medical company was founded in 2017 with a goal of creating high-performance, computer assisted surgical solutions using proprietary computer vision and artificial intelligence technologies, while remaining affordable in the challenging health system environment. The company states that its vision is to augment surgeons’ capabilities by creating new clinical pathways that are both efficient and effective, and that it aims to market its first surgical devices this year.
Unaided human surgery is going to be a thing of the past very soon. There are a number of companies working on robotic surgery devices to take the entire process away from humans. While that might be a ways off, we are likely to see a lot of augmentation over the next couple years.
The world of augmented reality might be the hybrid model that is required. Even though human doctors are performing the surgeries, the information provided is in their line of sight.
Over time, this could be used to feed the robotic systems. The information being passed along to the doctors could end up being data to feed the AI system.
As we are seeing, nothing in the technology world operates in a vacuum.
This is why exponential growth is possible. A single technological breakthrough can have impact on many different industries at the same time.
Healthcare is in need of help. Costs have gotten outrageous with no end in sight. We are going to have to see technological innovation that can save money across the board.
Without it, healthcare costs will bankrupt countries due to aging populations.
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