-
The next big thing in stroke treatment? Smartphones
October 4, 2012 Editor 0
Sure, smartphones are smart. But how smart? Advanced enough to let doctors help diagnose and treat stroke patients who might be hundreds of miles away from where they are.
A new study by the Mayo Clinic finds that the quality or brain scans and other medical images sent via smartphone are comparable to those viewed by desktop computers. The results confirm that smartphones can be effective in real-world telestroke healthcare (that is, health care delivered to stroke patients via phone applications).
“Essentially what this means is that telemedicine can fit in our pockets,” said Bart Demaerschalk, a professor of neurology and medical director of Mayo Clinic Telestroke. “For patients this means access to expertise in a timely fashion when they need it most, no matter what emergency room they may find themselves.”
In telestroke care, telemedicine platforms or robots in rural hospitals let a stroke patient be seen in real time by a neurology specialist located elsewhere. Mayo Clinic was the first medical center in Arizona to study telemedicine for stroke patients in non-urban settings, and is now the hub in a network of 12 telestroke centers, most of them in Arizona.
“If we can transmit health information securely and simultaneously use the video conferencing capabilities for clinical assessments, we can have telemedicine anywhere, which is essential in a state like Arizona where more than 40 percent of the population doesn’t have access to immediate neurologic care,” said Demaerschalk.
So far, the Mayo Clinic Telestroke Network has provided more than 1,000 emergency consultations for stroke.
Fast diagnoses of stroke can enable doctors to administer clot-busting medications within the narrow window of time in which permanent injury to a patient’s brain can be prevented. Telestroke care can also reduce costs by avoiding the need for ground or air ambulance transfer of patients to other medical centers.
Related Posts
Towards reinforcing telemedicine adoption amongst clinicians in Nigeria.
Local innovation for improving primary care cardiology in resource-limited African settings: an insight on the Cardio Pad(®) project in Cameroon.
A $16 Billion Dollar Future in Feature Phone App Development
Nigerian VoD content platform Dobox TV offers simultaneous online premiere of cinema releases
Android, then Project Loon, and now Project Ara: Google’s big ideas to connect the next 6 billion
The Age of Social Products
Categories: Health, Technology
Tags: Mayo Clinic Telestroke, neurology, smartphone, stroke patient, telemedicine
How Nigeria Is Using Kenyan Technology Wireless Wednesday | Understanding Kenya’s M-Health Ecosystem
Subscribe to our stories
Recent Posts
- SL Crowd Green Solutions September 21, 2020
- Digital transformation in the banking sector: surveys exploration and analytics August 3, 2020
- Why Let Others Disrupt You? Take the Smart Self-Disruption Journey! August 3, 2020
- 5 Tips for Crowdfunding During the Pandemic August 3, 2020
- innovation + africa; +639 new citations August 3, 2020
Categories
Archives
Popular Post-All time
- A review on biomass-based... 0.9k views
- Can blockchain disrupt ge... 682 views
- Prize-winning projects pr... 678 views
- Apply Now: $500,000 for Y... 605 views
- Test Your Value Propositi... 533 views