*Dr. Shafi Ahmed is one of those visionary surgeons who is using VR technology in the field of medicine and surgery
From smartphones to self-driven cars – as human beings existing in the age of technological revolution, the impacts of smart technology has permeated almost all facets of our lives. Businesses in all industries can benefit from digital transformation. Analytics can help them to better understand and serve customers. Access to real-time information leads to smarter decision-making. Automation enables them to increase efficiency. But industries vary in their digital transformation maturity rates.
The auto-industry has flourished by revolutionizing manufacturing through the usage of robots. Seamless omnichannel environments have been created by retailers who possess strong digital capabilities. Similarly, the healthcare industry has been transformed through electronic health records, digital tools that track patients’ vital signs, and virtual consultations between doctors and patients.
A Complete 360
Dr. Shafi Ahmed – a surgeon, cancer specialist, and co-founder of virtual and augmented reality firm Medical Realities – performed a surgery cutting off a tumor from the colon of a London man in his 70s. It was a routine procedure with limited risk involved. However, what made this standard operation an outstanding surgery was the use of 360-degree camera, which was mounted over the operation table capturing the doctor’s every movement in 4k and livestreamed globally using VR.
As associate Dean at Barts and the London Medical School, Dr. Shafi has spent years experimenting with how consumer technology can benefit healthcare. Dr. Shafi made headlines with his use of the Google glass to live-stream the removal of liver cancer from a surgeon’s point-of-view. After the launch of VR and AR technology, he put his mind to the impact of technology in radically changing the teaching methods in surgery and also solve a health equity crisis on the side.
A Teaching Tool
The doctor has travelled the globe and has witnessed first-hand the lack of infrastructure, training, machinery and even cadavers students in problematic areas like Gaza, sub-Saharan Africa and Bangladesh. Having being confronted with these issues, he believes the only way to attain the Lancet’s goal is through large scale radical change. VR and AR technology in the health industry retains the potential to train many people around the globe, in different parts of the world, especially in low-income countries.
Medical Realities, the company Ahmed founded in early 2015 together with VR innovator Steve Dann, is currently working to launch software that will enable Ahmed to teach remotely using 360-degree streaming and AR. Ahmed is also considering swapping his Google Glass with a new model of AR specs developed by San Francisco-based Osterhout Group. There is a huge cost involved in teaching one student at a time during a live operation and with the proliferation of connectivity, using technology like Glass connects surgeons across the globe in a few seconds, cutting out huge costs, and sustainably reach more students.
Close-up immersive streams will enable trainees to feel like they are part of the operation more than if they were in the theatre.
A Personal Touch
But surgery is a tactile job of lancets, scalpels and drills. To recreate that in VR, you need tactile feed. VR live-streams are the first step to what Ahmed calls “the virtual surgeon” – a project that involves shifting from live-capture VR to full computer-rendered simulations of surgical operations. And eventually, reactive virtual patients and gloves to provide tactile feedback. The next step of VR in surgery envisions a virtual body, haptic gloves, and a scalpel to make it realistic.
In a report released by the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery in 2015, it was revealed that about 5 billion people around the world are facing a severe lack of access to safe surgery. In order to curb this global shortage some two million surgeons, anesthetists and obstetricians will need to be trained over the next 15 years.
Achieving Singularity
Dr. Shafi theorizes the actual endgame of introducing VR technology at a large-scale into the healthcare industry. His argument suggests that when AI and robots have developed to a point that they can carry out surgery better than humans can – he calls it ‘surgical singularity’. Dr. Shafi has already developed a platform called Virtual Medics, which is a virtual medical website that can live stream consultant operations and allows interaction with the surgeon through instant message and chat box while acting as a repository for coaching and training. He has since created collaborations with tech firms and is creating virtual reality surgery.
Setting Strides
Other big players like Sony also seem to see value in Glass augmented-reality technology. Sony has launched their developer edition of SmartEyeGlass in 10 countries. It differs from Google Glass in a few ways, in the sense that the former has all its tech in-built into the frame, while Sony’s products offers a handheld controller, which helps conserve battery life and provides a tactile sensation. They are also working on a product named SmartEyeGlass Attach which is a clip-on version and can be attached to our regular eyewear. This customisation could be significant because the obtrusiveness of Google Glass seemed to make some people uncomfortable, wearers and observers alike; and the aesthetics of someone’s eyewear is a pretty personal choice. With other glass-type products in development, GlassUp, Laster, ORA, AIR, Toshiba Glass, it will be interesting to see where glass-wear fits into the competitive wearable tech market and how it shapes the healthcare industry as a whole.
