CHICAGO: Next up for cell phones with built-in digital cameras: making house calls for doctors.
Researchers in Switzerland reported the devices could be used to help diagnose and suggest treatment for some serious wounds in patients in remote locations far removed from a physician.
The report from University Hospital of Geneva looked at leg ulcers in 52 patients that were examined both in person and remotely by doctors in a nearby room who had only pictures of the same wounds taken by a first-generation camera phone.
They found remarkably high agreement between doctors who looked at the wound in person and those who saw the image.
If visiting nurses in remote locations can send such pictures in for consultation, "the transport of the patient ... to the hospital or the physician's office could be replaced, and this approach could potentially save the health care system money," the report said.
To assess the project, researchers used a statistical analysis that measures agreement when two groups rate the same object. The value ranged from one to zero, where one is perfect agreement and zero is no agreement. The wound study found the level of agreement between the remote and face-to-face evaluations "was very good, with values of up to 0.94," the study said.
The report was published in the February issue of the Archives of Dermatology.
"We were able to show for the first time that telemedicine for chronic wounds is feasible under routine conditions using this new generation of mobile telephones and direct transfer via e-mail," the authors said.
"We had the impression that a high percentage of the problems related to leg ulcers could be solved with this type of teleconsultation," they added.
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