Google Glass Could Soon Accompany Surgeons into the Operating Room

For the Everyman, wearing Google Glass seems a bit like overkill. Who needs to always be connected or record every minute of your life? But for specialty jobs that require a high level of expertise, say a heart surgeon, Google Glass might come in pretty handy, in fact it might just save your life. Surgeons and doctors may be some of the earlier adopter of Google Glass, which would allow them to view patient scans and monitor critical vital information while performing procedures. We just hope they aren’t using it to watch a PGA tournament or check their stocks while you’re under the knife. Think we’re years away still from Google Glass being used in surgery. Think again, it’s already happening. At the recent Rock Health conference in San Francisco, Dr. Pierre Theodore discussed his use of Google Glass during surgery to help him visualize anatomy while working on the patient. Glass was used to project images of the patient’s CT scans so Theodore could refer to them to help with the procedure. He explained that using Glass wasn’t disruptive, but in fact helpful to his work and described it as “akin to the switch a driver makes when glancing in the rear-view mirror.”

Google Glass can also be used to record a live surgery (with consent of course) for use in teaching situations. Since Glass allows hands-free recording from the viewer’s perspective, the video of a surgery from the surgeon himself is incredibly as a useful teaching tool. Other uses for Google Glass discussed at the Rock Health conference envision doctors wearing Glass while talking with patients to record histories and discussions for review at a later time. When connected with healthcare applications and software, like Augmedix is developing specifically for Google Glass, this could reduce the time doctors spend doing paper work and give them more time to attend to patients.