17 Jun 2002
(Reuter) Computers linked to digital cameras mounted on microscopes will soon cut the time taken to diagnose serious illnesses from weeks to hours. The new technique, know as Telepathology, links the best medical brains across the globe who can examine blood and tissue on slides and offer almost instant second opinions.
"Before the end of the century this whole technology will revolutionize medicine because of its speed of transmission of data," Dr James McGee, professor at Oxford University's Nuffield Department of Pathology and Bacteriology, said in an interview. McGee was peering at a screen in his Oxford laboratory. The color, high definition computer screen showed a cancerous tumour, at 1,000 times the magnification given by a regular light microscope.
McGee is able to swap slides, generated by digital cameras sitting on miscroscopes, with colleagues around the world. They give and receive second opinions as quickly as the computer and telephone lines can handle them.
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