Google’s Glass, like Microsoft’s Kinect, is getting into some unexpected places. One of these places is Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, a medical facility that has been conducting tests using the augmented reality glasses and, of all things, QR codes.
According to a blog post from Beth Israel Deaconess’ chief information officer John Halamka, the hospital used Glass in tests that were able to keep patient information, which was shown on the heads-up display that doctors wore, on their internal network. Patient information that was transmitted to Glass was accessed by way of a QR code, which was put outside the door of emergency patients. This allows doctors to converse with patients while still having all of the information they need at their… eyeball tips, we guess. But that’s not the only recent medical implementation of Glass that has come to light.
In the video below, dermatologists at at Rhode Island Hospital explain how they plan on using Google’s AR glasses to allow doctors to examine patients without actually being present in the room. There would be someone with the patient wearing Glass and the audio and video is streamed from the patient through the camera to a tablet or a similar device. The doctor can examine the skin condition in real-time and transmit instructions or an opinion on the problem back to the wearer who can relay it to the patient.
This would allow doctors to be ‘present’ even when they are at home, though it is very likely that dermatology would be one of the only medical professions who could take this route at the moment. It certainly won’t work for, say, a proctologist.
Source: Digital Trends