Now an Eye Phone!

According to a report 'Childhood blindness in India: A population based
perspective', an estimated  1.4 million children in the world
are blind, two-thirds of whom live in developing countries. The cause
of blindness in children vary according to region and socio-economic
development. Retinopathy of prematurity is one of the reasonable
contributors and causes of preventable infant blindness.



Right
to Sight

Childhood blindness is one of the priorities of WHO's Vision 2020: The
right to sight. It is in this context that Bengaluru-based Narayana
Nethralaya in collaboration with i2i TeleSolutions (also based in
Bengaluru) evolved a unique href="deloitte.com"> telemedicine
software, CARE TeleOphthalmology software that allows screening of
rural and semi-urban infants for a potentially blinding condition
called Retinopathy of prematurity (RoP) along with other conditions
including ocular cancers.



Says Sham Banerji, CEO of i2i TeleSolutions (the software partner for
the iPhone for ophthalmologist), “We started off
with our software that could be used in remote areas in laptops. But we
understood the problem and realized another delivery vehicle for the
specialists and ophthalmologists could be cellphones. We chose iPhone
because iPhone provides real time viewing of lossless digital images of
eyes, anywhere and anytime, remote screening and expert consultation
for ophthalmic diseases, rapid select and compare facility from
multiple studies, and the pinch and drag facility that the iPhone
has.”



The key worklist that can be included in iPhone using the software are
server based patient records and images available online, customized
content, easy consultation and collaboration between specialists over
cellular networks, and multiple levels of encryption and security. The
iPhone Teleophthalmology client application is a part of i2i CARE
platform and has been key in providing wireless access of patient
information and ophthalmic images. Key requirements for the service
includes subscribed access to i2i Connect services through WiFi or
mobile network or an iPhone or iPod touch models running iPhone OS3.0
or higher.



According to Banerji, “There are diseases such as diabetes,
heart diseases, diseases related to premature babies, cancer that are
directly related to vision. Our model for i2i is to enable healthcare
service providers with the software as well as the services.”
The iPhone has different kind of touch technologies ranging from old
resistive touch to the modern capacitor touch technology which has the
pinch and drag capability. The software allows monitoring of high
resolution images of eyes even in rural areas making patient treatment
possible.



The pilot project which will stretch to approximately 36 months
according to Narayana Nethralaya will also provide healthcare services
to other hospital and institutions specially the ophthalmologists. An
interesting thing about this project vis-a-vis other projects is that
it starts from a city (Bengaluru), to a state (Karnataka), to country
(India) and then worldwide rather than the other way round.



According to Dr Bhujang Shetty, Chairman of Narayana
Nethralaya,“With the experience of over 56,000 images of
infant retinas in our database, we required a dedicated web-based
software with progressive viewing to speedily allow access to our
experts at the base hospital. This quest lead to the development of
this new technology.”

 

Conclusion

Key advantages of using iPhone incorporating such software includes
faster data transmission with no packet loss, higher image quality,
minimum storage space, and low operating cost. Scarcity of
ophthalmologic care in the poor, remote rural areas, due to problems of
communication and lack of transport facilities, has made it difficult
for people to get an early diagnosis and treatment of eye disease.
Consequently, there is a high prevalence of blindness in the country.
However hospitals and service providers have left no stone unturned of
making this challenge as an opportunity and are very optimistic that
with the use of such applications they would be able to deliver
healthcare services effectively and literally be 'Visionaries' for
rural India.