Osaka Saiseikai Izuo Hospital in Japan is using the Vuzix M400 smart glasses to provide remote medical support within the hospital's infectious zones.

WHAT IT'S ABOUT

The Vuzix smart glasses enables hospital staff members working in the inpatient infectious disease ward to exchange information and instructions remotely via the Zoom application.

The hospital's inpatient infectious disease ward is divided into pathogen-contaminated areas (red zone) and uncontaminated sanitary areas (green zone). Medical personnel entering the red zone are required to wear personal protective equipment for safety reasons.

The smart glasses will enable staff members to give and receive instructions from staff located in a different zone. For instance, healthcare staff working in the red zone can double-check the medication and treatments administered to patients in the infectious wards with doctors located in the green zone.

WHY IT MATTERS

The use of augmented reality smart glasses facilitates remote communication between staff in the red and green zones, reducing the number of medical personnel required to enter the hospital's infectious areas. This allows the hospital to operate efficiently with a limited number of staff members working within the pathogen-contaminated areas of the infectious disease ward.

Additionally, the Vuzix smart glasses can offer support in operating and resolving issues with advanced medical equipment. Using these smart glasses, clinical engineers will be able to take part in medical treatment provision remotely while operating medical equipment.

Besides medical support provision, the hospital also believes that these smart glasses will play a role in a broader spectrum of areas, including telemedicine and education.

THE LARGER TREND

Smart glasses have been seeing a steady increase in use over the past few years. Back in 2018, a Netherlands-based firm developed a telehealth communication platform that extensively utilises AR eyewear via several partnerships with Vuzix. The following year, Vuzix teamed up with VSee, a telemedicine technology supplier, to create a smart glasses offering for telemedicine with potential applications for telesurgery, medical training and first responders.

More recently, Vuzix announced that its smart glasses would be used within operating theatres, allowing medical staff working in operating rooms to broadcast 4K quality imagery to other staff members while interacting with them from a safe distance.

But Vuzix isn't the only health tech company making a break with smart glasses. In 2020, a GCC-based startup launched Amal Glass – AI-powered smart glasses that provide assistance to the visually impaired. This wearable tech converts visual data into audio to help the wearer process their surroundings and read text.

And earlier this month, Envision, an artificial intelligence technology company, debuted the latest version of its AI-powered smart glasses. This product will also assist the visually impaired, enabling them to identify friends, process texts and handle day-to-day tasks independently.

ON THE RECORD

Paul Travers, the president and chief executive officer at Vuzix mentioned in a statement: "With their high-performance specs, all-day wearability and hands-free operation, Vuzix smart glasses are tailor-made for use within hospitals and for telemedicine in general. We are seeing more and more doctors and hospitals around the world testing and adopting our smart glasses and we look forward to working further with customers like Osaka Saiseikai Izuo Hospital to make their day-to-day operations safer and more productive."