WEARABLE COMPUTER Google Glass puts patient scans in surgeons' field of view.

Google Glass could soon occupy that sliver of space under the headlights on your surgeon's forehead. "Cool stuff," says Indiana University trauma surgeon Paul Szotek, MD. "Wearable technology is going to revolutionize surgery."

Two months ago, Dr. Szotek operated with the assistance of Google Glass, the wearable computer that looks like a pair of space-age glasses. As he cut during the 4-hour surgery to remove an abdominal tumor, he gave Google Glass simple voice commands and up popped preloaded MRI scans of the patient's tumor on the tiny battery-powered, head-mounted display just over his right eye. "Like looking through your car's rearview mirror," says Dr. Szotek. "I didn't take my eyes off of the patient."

Rather than walk across the OR to see the MRI, Dr. Szotek simply glanced up and to the right, never leaving his patient's side or losing his concentration. "Sure, you can pull up an MRI during a case, but you have to walk over to the wall to look at it," he says.

What's it like wearing them? When the device with the built-in camera and microphone flips on, it takes up a small quadrant of your vision. If your field of vision were a tic-tac-toe board, Google Glass would occupy the upper-right square.

Having gotten a taste of Google Glass in the OR, Dr. Szotek envisions wearable technology playing an expanded role in surgery, with surgical team members wearing Google Glass and having access to the patient's EMR and MRI once they've scanned the bar code on the patient's bracelet. "Then transport comes out, and all the data pops up right in front of their face," he says. That's not all. With a simple voice command, you could call up the pre-op checklist and patient lab data. Anesthesia could track real-time vitals. You'd get a reminder when it's time to redose antibiotics. You'd say "take a picture" to take a picture and "take a video" to take video.

"We're talking seamless integration from the initial encounter with the patient all the way through the operating room," says Dr. Szotek.

Dr. Szotek was selected to try out a Google Glass prototype ($1,500 plus tax). It's believed that about a dozen other surgeries have been performed using Google Glass. Google aims to launch Google Glass (google.com/glass/start) later this year. It's expected to cost $500 to $600 during the initial launch.

— Dan O'Connor

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