The entire article is 9 pages of well-reasoned scenarios involve wireless devices galore, dynamic health monitoring and remote doctor consultation. Some of the technology looks to be lifted from Star Trek, but most of the ideas could be implemented tomorrow, should someone bankroll the cash, time and necessary legislation. (Keep in mind, US healthcare won't even acknowledge devices as practical as the iPhone.)

My personal favorite idea was this Smart Mirror (and not just for the PG-level cartoon nudity). It's a touchscreen monitor that can track most vitals through your hand. But it does a lot more, from listing your recent exercises to tracking your sleep patterns to performing bi-weekly body scans to test for melanoma.

From these short, daily checks, a doctor is left with a ton of analyzable trend data (surely software could be employed to summarize trends) that's potentially more reliable than general self-reporting. The user is left with a mirror on their bathroom wall—something they had in the first place.

Very cool stuff. [Fast Company]

This is one crazy robot. Here's just a partial list of features:

Quality CPR Feedback Laerdal's Q-CPR technology measures the quality of CPR providing real time feedback on compression rate, depth, release, and hands-off time as well as generating palpable pulses , blood pressure wave forms and ECG artefacts.

Convulsions
Degrees of seizures and convulsions can be created from minor effect through to a full convulsion through the Instructor Mode.

Bleeding and Wounds
Wound models can be connected to an internal blood reservoir which will bleed both from arterial and venous vessels. Connected to the simulator's physiological modeling, SimMan 3G will react appropriately according to treatment.

Wireless Monitor
Part of the complete wireless simulation solution, the wireless monitor enables you to observe the patient simulator's vital signs while moving around freely during training.

Secretions
The new eye secretions feature has multiple scenario applications such as responsive reactions to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear agents.

Drug & Event Recognition
The new and advanced Drug Recognition System allows students to administer drugs simultaneously. It registers the amount, speed and type of drug automatically and applies the appropriate physiological responses, saving the instructor time and improving the overall intelligent debrief.

Eye Signs
Include pupillary responses to light, blinks at slow, normal and fast rates, winks and open, partially open and closed reactions.

Vascular Access
In addition to the standard vascular access in the right arm, the new intraosseous access via the tibia and sternum allows for procedure accuracy

Chest Decompression & Chest Drain
Students can now perform a needle Thoracentesis and insert a chest drain bi-laterally.

It's not quite as good as practicing medicine on a hobo that you hunted and caught yourself, but I guess that's not always an option. [SimMan 3G via MedGadget]

The old da Vinci was alright, but the new da Vinci Si surgical system displays your intestines in 3D HD (a perspective created through a double-camera, double-display stereoscopic system) so that a surgeon can marvel at the efficiency of your GI tract and feel like those vital organs are right there.

So would you prefer a surgeon to perform your next operation, or a surgeon behind the da Vinci? We'd prefer a normal surgeon donning old school blue and red 3D glasses. [da Vinci via medgadget]

However, like any medical invention, there's testing and trials to be done, and this lightsaber cancer-fighter is no exception. Still, hearing the inventor describe this thing you can't help but get excited.

"We can use lasers to punch tiny holes exactly where we want them," said Dr. Frank Gunn-Moore. "We can produce a rod of light - sometimes described as a sword - that can even go around objects. It really does sound like science fiction."

The good doctor doesn't plan on stopping with cancer, either. Other diseases, such as Alzheimer's, are potential targets too. Good form. [Herald Sun, thanks Yash!]

Information gathered by the Health Guide is then encrypted and sent to the patient's health care professional using Intel's Health Care Management Suite, which is supposedly secure enough to handle sensitive patient records.

By shifting a lot of the effort of monitoring patients with chronic health problems out of the hospital and into the home, Intel says insurance and health care companies can save money and give better, more personalized care. The Intel Health Guide is expected to be commercially available from health care providers either late 2008 or early 2009. [Crunchgear]

"Never in your life have you ever swallowed anything and it's still sticking out of your mouth, but once you do it, it's easy," he said of the device. It consists of seven fiber optic cables in a capsule about the size of a painkiller, with a 1.4-mm tether that allows the doctor to move the camera around and pull it back up once the exploration is finished.

Testing starts at the Seattle Veterans' Administration hospital next year. Once given the thumbs-up, the reusable gadget (disinfect, rinse, repeat, I guess) is expected to be used in the fight against oesophagal cancer. Normal endoscopes are considerably bigger and can only be swallowed after the patient has been sedated (and liberally greased up, probably).

[CNN]

A year before, Dubrovik, a 37-year-old, had "Hot Rod" tattooed on his peen for a $1,000 bet (let me guess, in large gothic letters, with flames coming out of the base, right?). "It was the most horrible thing I went through in my life," said Sean of his gallbladder operation genital inking, which just raises the question, why did you do it, dumbass?

Anyway, enough of the heinous penis backstory, let's get back to the clinic. A scandalized member of the surgical team reported Hansen's actions to the clinic, but not before tipping off the local newspaper. The surgeon, who had apparently shown his patient's artwork to his fellow surgeons, called Dubrovik to apologize, assuring him that he had deleted the photo.

"I feel violated, betrayed and disgusted" says Dubrovik, who is considering legal action, of the surgeon's actions, which is probably similar to how all those folks who saw the photo of his tattoo feel. Meanwhile, the doctor, who is on administrative leave pending an investigation, could lose his job. [BBC Online]

Local man Leonardo Molina was on the operating table undergoing an appendectomy when the lights went out in the town of Villa Mercedes' Policlinico Juan D. Peron. A relative, thought to be the 29-year-old patient's elder brother Ricardo, collected up mobiles from other patients' families who were waiting in the hallway, and took them into the theater.

According to hospital director Dario Maurer, the blackout lasted just 20 minutes. Ricardo Molina, however, claimed that the hospital was without power for an hour, and the anesthetic administered to his brother was wearing off. [Reuters]

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