4K operating room technology lets doctors at Hong Kong hospital live-stream procedures at high resolution, monitor surgeries remotely
- Queen Elizabeth Hospital has carried out seven neurosurgeries using 4K live streaming and video conferencing since installing 5G network in its operating theatres
- Consulting surgeons can watch the 4K footage remotely, provide advice to the doctors in the operating theatre
A technological upgrade to operating theatres at a Hong Kong public hospital has allowed doctors to live-stream procedures at 4K resolution, which provides a picture detailed enough that consulting surgeons can monitor the work and offer advice remotely.
As many as 50 patients who require brain surgery would benefit from the more advanced approach, according to Kowloon Central Cluster Information Technology Department Systems Manager Wallace Cheng Wang.
“Neurosurgeries require a high standard for the video resolution of the veins and nervous system,” he said. “If the images are not clear enough, the situation at the operating theatre cannot be clearly reflected in the live broadcast.”
Four types of footage are derived from a 20 times-magnifying 4K lens, a wide-angle lens that shows the environment of the operating theatre, a microscope and a navigation system that indicates the position of the surgical instruments inside the patient.
“For such a precise surgery, one second of delay in the live-streaming is already considered not ideal,” he said. “The doctors may have already missed something.”