Mobile communication devices in the fight against cardiovascular disease
The emerging field of mobile health can provide reliable and timely clinical diagnosis for complications arising from cardiovascular disease. For remote monitoring and diagnosis to be effective and efficient, wireless medical video communication systems require new methods for and approaches to medical video processing, wireless transmission and video quality assessment. With EU funding, the DRIVEN (Diagnostically robust ultrasound video transmission over emerging wireless networks) project set out to develop a robust and resilient ultrasound video transmission system for remote diagnosis, monitoring and intervention of cardiovascular patients. Project partners validated the system in cardiovascular remote diagnosis applications for stroke and aortic aneurism cases where timely surgery might be needed. They also studied video communications to assist decision makers during disasters and the transmission of trauma video for emergency response. Results show how particular diagnostic choices can be safely made thanks to medical video communications. A new video coding algorithm was developed to boost diagnostic robustness and bandwidth efficiency during transmission over wireless networks. The team demonstrated how using noise filtering algorithms before video encoding can considerably reduce bandwidth. DRIVEN became the first EU-funded initiative to examine the efficiency of a new video compression standard on medical video communications. Experiments revealed that beyond 3.5G wireless networks can help achieve low-delay, high-resolution (and high frame-rate) ultrasound video communications. In addition, medical video quality assessment methods were validated. Lastly, outcomes led to the development of an open source telemedicine platform for real-time wireless transmission of medical videos. The DRIVEN system will enable cardiovascular patients living in remote areas to receive critical care equal to that given in hospitals. It is also paving the way for medical video communication systems in traditional clinical practice.
Keywords
Cardiovascular disease, medical video, communication systems, mobile health, video transmission
