(PRWEB UK) 13 May 2011
Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) has announced the development of "ENDEAVOR-Mobile", the world's first fully Android-based mobile teleradiology collaboration platform. The technology allows doctors to share, annotate and discuss medical images across a range of handheld devices in real-time, enhancing diagnostic procedures and enabling doctors to reach a broader field of patients.
Diagnostic imaging has become indispensable in modern medical practice. To give the best treatment possible doctors discuss images with specialists, usually requiring all parties to be under one roof. While doctors have previously been able to share images virtually, ENDEAVOR-Mobile allows doctors to quickly source expert opinions from their colleagues and discuss critical medical cases in real-time, regardless of location.
Doctors can share annotations of images, drawn with their fingertips, while simultaneously discussing the case orally over a standard mobile line. While one other similar product exists for Apple devices, the Java based application is not limited to any single operating system, can be shared with desktop computers and is currently being tested on a range of Android based devices. Bandwidth issues are avoided by the independent transfer of images and annotations, reducing running costs and expanding the number of locations in which ENDEAVOR-Mobile can be used.
The technology has been developed by a multi-disciplinary team of experienced medical doctors, image analysis researchers, and software engineers in USM's Computer Vision Research Group. As part of the ENDEAVOR suite, which incorporates cutting edge image analysis technologies in real world healthcare solutions, ENDEAVOR-Mobile is expected to be market ready in the very near future. Several hospitals have been earmarked for conducting pilot runs of the entire ENDEAVOR suite, and various telecoms providers are in consultation to fully utilize the mobile capability of ENDEAVOR-Mobile.
In 2009, the ratio of doctors to patients in Malaysia stood at 1:940, above the recommended ratio of 1:600 standard set by the World Health Organisation. By enabling medical professionals to consult regardless of geographical location, such new teleradiology technology will allow doctors to reach a broader swathe of the population, helping to democratize healthcare delivery.
For further information, contact:
Mohamad Abdullah
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Email: pro(at)notes(dot)usm(dot)my
Appendix 1
Detailed Technical Specifications of ENDEAVOR MOBILE
i) This Java based application is not limited to any single OS. ENDEAVOR MOBILE has true multi-platform capability, and works perfectly well on both Macintosh and Windows based systems. It is currently being tested on a range of Android based smart phones and Tablet devices.
ii) ENDEAVOR MOBILE is equipped with an advanced Client Management system to efficiently organize sessions with multiple clients from different locations. Multiple user requests are queued in turn via our Circular Token and Hash Polling mechanisms to ensure effective and organized discussion sessions.
ii) Seamlessly integrates Live Image Case discussion sessions between various mobile and non-mobile devices i.e. PC's, laptops, Tablets and Android smart phones.
iv) Multiple annotation and commenting tools including free hand sketch, rectangles, lines, arrows and measurement tools.
v) Annotations and comments are transferred independently of images and recombined later to avoid bandwidth issues. This is a far better approach than the conventional screen sharing technology-where the entire screen is transferred to all other clients. Screen sharing technology may result in megabytes of data being sent over, every time a simple line is drawn. This is especially unsuitable for the mobile platform, where data charges may be prohibitive. In this approach, the transferred data is measured in mere kilobytes.
Appendix 2 (see attached file for images)
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