House-age know-how brings ultrasound companies to Gravelbourg – DiscoverMooseJaw.com

Expertise initially produced to observe the well being of astronauts in house will quickly carry ultrasound companies to St. Joseph’s Hospital in Gravelbourg.  

The MELODY Telerobotic Ultrasound System know-how was developed by the European House Company. It’s now being tailored by Saskatchewan’s healthcare trade to carry vital companies to rural and distant areas of the province.  

For Gravelbourg residents, the closest centre to obtain an ultrasound is Moose Jaw, which is about an hour and a half away.  

The initiative first started in Northern Saskatchewan and in November of 2022 Gravelbourg grew to become the primary group in Southern Saskatchewan to get the know-how. Technicians from Paris, France, needed to fly to Saskatoon and drove to Gravelbourg to put in the system.  

Saskatchewan has the one telerobotic ultrasound program within the nation and probably the most experience with the know-how on this planet.  

“We had been pioneers within the adaption of this space-age know-how for clinic use,” mentioned Dr. Ivar Mendez, professor of surgical procedure and director of the digital care and distant presence robotics program on the College of Saskatchewan.  

The initiative is a partnership between the U of S, the Saskatchewan Well being Authority and the Jim Pattison Youngsters’s Hospital Basis to get the assets and funding to buy and set up the system in Gravelbourg.  

Mendez mentioned the problem with ultrasounds is that they have to be carried out by a restricted variety of professional ultra-sonographers and can’t be carried out by simply anybody, particularly prenatal ultrasounds to test on the well being of unborn infants.  

This new know-how permits the professional ultra-sonographer to carry out the service from 1000’s of kilometres away. Within the case of St. Joseph’s Hospital, a technician in Saskatoon performs the ultrasound utilizing a robotic arm. All that’s wanted in Gravelbourg is a web site assistant, who doesn’t want any particular coaching, to carry the body the place the robotic arm is put in. Mendez mentioned in different areas they’ve had everybody from nurses to clerks as web site assistants.  

A sonographer in Saskatoon performs an ultrasound on a affected person at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Gravelbourg utilizing telerobotic know-how. (Photograph courtesy: Jim Pattison Youngsters’s Hospital Basis)

Encrypted knowledge permits the affected person and the technician to see and talk with one another and see the ultrasound image in real-time confidentially. In any other case, Mendez mentioned it really works with a daily web connection.  

“In the event you can play your Netflix film in your TV, this method will work with that quantity of bandwidth,” he mentioned.  

Mendez’s preliminary research from Northern Saskatchewan confirmed a 97 per cent acceptance from sufferers that means the overwhelming majority of sufferers would relatively have the ultrasound achieved in their very own group versus flying into Saskatoon for the service.  

Over 300 ultrasounds have been carried out in Northern Saskatchewan utilizing the know-how, with 80 per cent of these ultrasounds being for prenatal care. Mendez mentioned research up to now have proven that robotic ultrasounds are pretty much as good and as correct as standard in-person ultrasounds.  

The robotic ultrasound system in Gravelbourg has solely been used for assessments at this level with prenatal care sufferers, however Mendez is hoping the service will likely be accessible very quickly.  

Mendez mentioned the final word objective is to scale up the mission to succeed in as many rural and distant communities as doable and adapt it to the common methods to change into part of the evolution of digital care. Nevertheless, he felt robotics wouldn’t exchange people.  

“This know-how is absolutely unstoppable. It’ll occur. We’re going to have sooner or later a hybrid system the place we will likely be utilizing superior digital care applied sciences with in-person healthcare deliveries,” he mentioned.  

He feels know-how will enable healthcare staff, physicians and nurses, to commit extra time to have a look at sufferers holistically, have extra time with sufferers, and enhance the doctor-patient relationship.  

Under you possibly can hear Dr. Mendez’s full interview with Uncover Moose Jaw’s Shawn Slaght in addition to a video from the Jim Pattison Youngsters’s Hospital Basis exhibiting how the system works.