What happened to Google Glass? After its much hyped and well-covered debut, the head-mounted device seems to have fallen off the radar.
For what it was worth (a whole $1,500), Google Glass was found to be more of a quirky, niche device. One for the supernerds and the early adopters, it was arguably kinda cool in the beginning and then things just got creepy.
Google's Glass ultimately made it to the mainstream when the term "glasshole" - a term used to describe inconsiderate people using the device in socially unacceptable ways such as in the bathroom, for example - started becoming popular. Today, however, we're seeing more positive uses for the device that can actually help save lives.
For the first time ever, Google Glass helped assist in saving a life after a successful heart surgery was completed by doctors in Poland. Cardiologists from the Institute of Cardiology in Warsaw, successful restored blood flow to a chronically blocked right coronary artery of a 49-year-old man using a custom-made application used in conjunction with Android Wear on a Google Glass device.
Normally, such procedures in patients with chronic heart problems liked blocked arteries are not successful partly because it's difficult to see the the blockage with conventional medical technology such as coronary tomography angiography (CTA).
Using Google Glass, however, surgeons could see a three-dimensional reconstruction of the affected artery. The device also allowed for zooming and changing images via a hands-free voice recognition system which further enabled doctors to visualize the distal coronary vessel much more clearly. Because of the eye-opening perspective, the surgeons were able to direct a guide wire through to the blocked vessel.
"This case demonstrates the novel application of wearable devices for display of CTA data sets in the catheterization laboratory that can be used for better planning and guidance of interventional procedures, and provides proof of concept that wearable devices can improve operator comfort and procedure efficiency in interventional cardiology," said Maksymilian P. Opolski, MD, PhD, the lead investigator of the Department of Interventional Cardiology and Angiology at the Institute of Cardiology, Warsaw, Poland.
In the end, the heart procedure was a success, and has opened a new possibility for Google Glass use in the medical field.
Photo: Kārlis Dambrāns | Fiickr
