One of the areas in which Augmented Reality is really making a difference for everyone is medicine.
As the process of decoding the human genome continues, 23&me has become one of the most known services in genetics. This company provides you with a detailed genetic analysis that shows how prone you are to certain diseases or conditions. At the same time, you can build your own family tree and see how the mixture of different families and races increases or decreases the likelihood of certain conditions. And finally, you can get in touch with people that have similar genes as you and try to see how specific genes affected their lives! All this is achieved through a $100 mail-it-yourself kit, which includes a small medical apparatus for you to send a blood sample.
So what does Augmented Reality have to do with this? Well this is the first step, as the world we live in is characterized by exponentially growing information and increased interconnection of data. Imagine you are enjoying an afternoon trek in Cinque Terre, Italy, and suddenly fall and get a concussion that knocks you out. Your partner rushes you to the local hospital, where the physician gets instant access to your digital records just from your thumbprint. She sees all your information in a tablet or even wearable glasses, which could even tell her instantly your blood pressure, locate the hematoma at the place of trauma, and show your white and red blood cell movement. There is no loss of precious seconds to take care of your injury. Now imagine the same situation, but you have a heart attack in the streets of Pasadena. Think of how valuable that information would be for the paramedics treating you and how much more prepared the doctors would be when you arrived at the hospital.
Even further, imagine being able to perform DIY checks for your blood pressure, sugar levels, calorie intake or even weight that automatically record your levels and maintain updated daily records accessible to your doctor to track daily variance and how you stick to your diet. It's possible that your bathroom mirror could provide your daily checkup while you brush your teeth!
Did you know that less that 20% of all doctor's appointments require that the physician actually touch the patient? That means that 80% of diagnostics could be performed remotely, via chat or by sending pictures. This could allow patients to speak with a doctor quickly, prevent unnecessary visits and transaction costs, and sensibly reduce healthcare expenses. These developments, along with the preventive diagnostics of small and relatively inexpensive wearable devices, are completely changing the medical environment. Companies are even making the devices more imperceptible and even fashionable to prevent the embarrassment of carrying an ugly medical device.
Did you know that less that 20% of all doctor's appointments require that the physician actually touch the patient? That means that 80% of diagnostics could be performed remotely, via chat or by sending pictures. This could allow patients to speak with a doctor quickly, prevent unnecessary visits and transaction costs, and sensibly reduce healthcare expenses. These developments, along with the preventive diagnostics of small and relatively inexpensive wearable devices, are completely changing the medical environment. Companies are even making the devices more imperceptible and even fashionable to prevent the embarrassment of carrying an ugly medical device.
These changes will also affect more intense and invasive procedures. How many people avoid their checkups because of the way colonoscopies or prostate exams are conducted? Imagine how many diseases could be prevented if people were able to virtually go through those procedures. The technology is almost there, and the initial trials are being carried in order to avoid intrusion on the patient, one of the biggest traumas during certain exams. At the same time, robotics and augmented reality are tearing down the walls of physical presence of doctors during procedures. Some surgeries have already been conducted with physicians located miles away and operating a terminal connected through the internet to the operating room. We can now even have a multidisciplinary team of doctors in 5 continents and participating together in the same surgery. They could see your whole diagnosis, identify possible problems during the procedures, and react faster to them.
Imagine the implications for remote or underserved towns that currently lack facilities due to high costs and low populations. Specific modern hospitals could be built at almost no cost and with little staff with a few minor futuristic devices and physicians with regular office hours connected by Internet. We could virtually build a hospital everywhere just with the internet and electricity.
Scientist are already testing the "cancer pill", a pill shaped analysis tool that will screen your whole body from inside and detect the possibility of cancer surfacing, converting damaging control medicine into completely preventive medicine. This type of pill is being tested for diverse diagnostics, and we could consider them to be a part of our routine weekend check-up while they transfer tons of data to our files like the Spider Robots from Minority Report.
Other implications for medicine include advancements made in prosthetics and the possibility to build functional exoskeletons for disabled persons and allow them to walk again. Even more, initial trials are being done to get 3D printers to create organs! This will allow thousands of people waiting for organ donors to get organs quickly and prevent potential rejections due to incompatibilities, as they could be designed from scratch to match the patient.
All these developments are making medicine more personalized, so the doctor of the future will prescribe the drug you need to cure your problem and not a generic cure based on a generic condition. Physicians will know how you react or how people with your genes react to the common cold and know that Drug X is much more effective than Drug Y. This information would continue to build your personal file and the personal files of thousands of people worldwide that share part of your genes...
Augmented Reality is building a faster, more efficient, and personalized health system. Imagine medicine based in prevention, doctors that are constantly updated about patients' developments even though they are miles away, and people proudly using sleek and fashionable check-up devices that screen them for diseases without being invasive.
For further information, we recommend these two amazing talks about what the future is weaving for augmented reality in a medical environment:
