We've all heard it in the news: Superbug Hits Hospital, New Virus Kills Sick, Deadly Bug In NHS.
Viruses and bugs spread like wildfire - that's no exaggeration! You can imagine how a hospital is like a breeding ground for them, especially with all those weakened immune systems. Well imagine just how vulnerable you are lying on the operating table.
Sure, surgeons and staff "scrub in" before entering the room and it's meant to be a designated clean zone, but how clean can it be?
When a surgeon needs to look again at your chart, at the procedure or at scans, often all that is available is the digital copy. Get him a tablet pc you say! But do you really want a surgeon, who will then go on to be touching your insides (sorry!) handling a filthy tablet during each operation? Not quite ideal! In reality, what the surgeon will do is take off all the gear, go into another room, load up the data on the computer, scrub back in, before re-entering the operating room.
Of course you are still lying there, opened out for all to see - for germs to see!
What if the surgeon could call up the information on screen without having to touch anything? Step in the Xbox Kinect. Yes, that's right, the games console your kids play on will soon be used in surgery. The Kinect is a controller-less device which senses body movements to operate (excuse the pun) an on-screen command. Doctors can use various hand gestures to rotate scans, pan through 3D images and recall important data - all without getting their hands dirty!
Any advance in medicine is great, but to see a games console help in this? It's child's play!
Viruses and bugs spread like wildfire - that's no exaggeration! You can imagine how a hospital is like a breeding ground for them, especially with all those weakened immune systems. Well imagine just how vulnerable you are lying on the operating table.
Sure, surgeons and staff "scrub in" before entering the room and it's meant to be a designated clean zone, but how clean can it be?
When a surgeon needs to look again at your chart, at the procedure or at scans, often all that is available is the digital copy. Get him a tablet pc you say! But do you really want a surgeon, who will then go on to be touching your insides (sorry!) handling a filthy tablet during each operation? Not quite ideal! In reality, what the surgeon will do is take off all the gear, go into another room, load up the data on the computer, scrub back in, before re-entering the operating room.
Of course you are still lying there, opened out for all to see - for germs to see!
What if the surgeon could call up the information on screen without having to touch anything? Step in the Xbox Kinect. Yes, that's right, the games console your kids play on will soon be used in surgery. The Kinect is a controller-less device which senses body movements to operate (excuse the pun) an on-screen command. Doctors can use various hand gestures to rotate scans, pan through 3D images and recall important data - all without getting their hands dirty!
Any advance in medicine is great, but to see a games console help in this? It's child's play!
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