Google Glass helped to enhance the way that a surgeon can perform various procedures.
Two surgeons from the Indiana University Health Methodist Hospital have started using wearable technology in the form of Google’s augmented reality glasses to be able to boost their ability to make appropriate surgical decisions.
These doctors use the wearable tech’s voice control to access the information that they require, when they need it.
The two physicians, Dr. Szotek and Dr. Browne, became the first in the hospital to start using the augmented reality glasses during abdominal surgeries. They now each wear Glass during this procedure, which typically lasts around four hours. With them, they can access medical information – including records specific to the patient – as they remove tumors.
The augmented reality glasses can provide X-ray and MRI data on its floating display.
This information can all be shown by the wearable technology without getting in the way of the surgeon’s line of sight for the actual surgery itself. As it is commanded by the surgeon’s voice, there is no need to take hands away from where they are most needed and without upsetting the operating room’s sterile environment.
That said, this is only believed to be the start of the uses for Google Glass for these surgeons. They believe that these mobile devices will be more broadly helpful in the medical field as a whole. While other surgeons have used the gadgets’ point of view video streaming in order to educate themselves and have provided students with a live insight into every different phase of a surgery, Dr. Szotek sees this tech going further. He hopes to be able to use biological tracers so that his AR glasses will be able to actually differentiate between healthy tissue and the tumor, itself.
He stated that being able to automatically differentiate between these two tissues “could revolutionize the field of cancer surgery”. This would help to make certain that the tissue could be more completely removed while leaving the maximum amount of healthy tissue behind.
It could also be beneficial for emergency first responders to wear augmented reality glasses so that they would be better capable of handling unusual types of accident or medical condition, and to be able to provide them with accurate remote instructions.
Voicekey wins contract from UK government concerning development of new m-commerce platform
Voicekey, a developer of biometric security solutions, has been awarded a commercial contract from the United Kingdom’s Technology Strategy Board. The contract represents the second phase of a mobile commerce initiative in the United Kingdom. During the first phase, Voicekey was able to introduce new technologies and security features to the mobile space. The second phase will focus on the development of a market-ready mobile commerce solution that will be easily accessible to consumers as well as secure.
UK consumers are becoming more interested in comprehensive m-commerce services and platforms
Consumers throughout the United Kingdom have become very interested in the concept of mobile payments and purchasing products from merchants using only their mobile devices. Many consumers have encountered troubling problems with the mobile commerce platforms that they use on a regular basis, however. Lackluster security has put consumer’s financial information at risk of exploitation and poorly designed platforms have created an unfavorable experience for many people. The demand for easy to use, well developed, and secure platforms has been on the rise.
Merchants and consumers are somewhat reluctant to engage in the mobile commerce space
Voicekey aims to address that merchants and consumers have when it comes to mobile commerce. For consumers, accessibility has become a serious issue. Many platforms make use of NFC technology, but few people actually have the NFC-enabled mobile devices needed to use these platforms. For merchants, security is a major issue. Merchants are also somewhat uncertain about the potential revenue growth they could see by engaging mobile consumers more aggressively.
Platform expected to be equipped with biometric security technology but will not be based on NFC technology
Voicekey is expected to develop a platform that will address many of these issues. The platform is likely to make use of the company’s biometric security technology, alleviating some of the security concerns that merchants and consumers have. The platform is also expected to be more accessible to consumers without NFC-enabled devices. The platform may use NFC to some extent, but it will not be entirely based upon the technology.