Some patients in the future may be able to stay at home rather than go to hospital or a nursing home due to a range of technologies being developed by CSIRO as part of its "Hospital Without Walls" initiative.

"We are aiming to give people more options," says Dr Robert Gill, a scientist with CSIRO Telecommunications & Industrial Physics. "A lot of people would rather stay at home for care. Our technology will make this possible by allowing healthcare professionals to monitor them remotely."

The first stage of a new home telecare system will be unveiled at the Commercialising Health Innovations Forum, 5-6 October 1999, at the Bellarine Hall, Convention Centre in Melbourne.

CSIRO is working with the Centre for Online Health and the Distributed Systems Technology Centre on some aspects of the system with an initial prototype trial planned for later this year.

The systems will allow home monitoring of elderly patients who have had to go to hospital casualty following falls that don't have an obvious cause. Possible causes of such falls include a number of cardiovascular conditions that can only be diagnosed at the time of a fall. People therefore need to be monitored at the time of fall to help with diagnosis.

"Patients requiring such monitoring will wear a portable device with sensors capable of measuring heart rate and body movement," says Dr Gill.

"A personal computer located within the home will record data from a number of sensors and transfer the data to a remote assessment centre at regular intervals via telephone. Visiting health professionals such as the home nursing service will be able to access complete records of vital signs and add them to the patient's records."

Although the focus is currently on aged care it is envisaged that the system will also be used by the chronically ill and will improve the standard of healthcare in rural and remote areas.

Planned enhancements to the system include integration of an electronic patient record, patient information and teleconferencing facilities.

Dr Gill says that the system was developed using a combination of CSIRO's expertise in medical technology, image and signal processing, telecommunications, data management and analysis. It is one of a range of healthcare technologies aimed at improving the quality of healthcare and reducing costs.

Another example of a successful CSIRO/industry collaboration on show is the Skin Polarprobe®, an instrument for monitoring and diagnosing the deadly skin cancer melanoma.

The Skin Polarprobe® was developed by Australian medical instrumentation company Polartechnics Limited in collaboration with the Sydney Melanoma Unit and CSIRO. CSIRO image analysis software lies at the heart of the Skin Polarprobe®.

The very high diagnostic accuracy of the system attracted a lot of attention from skin cancer and melanoma experts at the International Congress of the International Society for Skin Imaging in London in July.

With the Skin Polarprobe® in their surgeries, dermatologists and general practitioners can capture images of a patient's skin lesions and automatically analyse them to assist in making a reliable diagnosis.

"Even the best melanoma specialists can't tell which moles will become melanomas," says Mike Hirshorn of Polartechnics.

"The Skin Polarprobe® helps doctors monitor the appearance of a patient's moles over time so changes can be detected much earlier. This makes it ideal for skin cancer screening programs."

The system is now a prototype product with applications. Clinical studies of prototype systems are in progress, and US studies are expected to start later this year or early 2000.

Polartechnics is looking for international partners to assist in the commercialisation and distribution of the device.

Other CSIRO technologies being showcased at the forum include: innovative methods for managing and accessing medical data; systems for measuring the performance of healthcare organisations; multi-sensory interactive modelling and visualisation systems for realistic surgical training; teleradiology techniques for real time, low bandwidth transmission of high quality ultrasound and knowledge-based systems for analysis of pre-operative 3D CT scans to produce realistic computer patient organ models.

More information:

Re: Hospital Without Walls:

Dr Rob Gill, CSIRO 0417 258 235

e-mail:robert.gill@tip.csiro.au

Carole David, CSIRO work 02 9372 4245 mobile: 0419 259 560

e-mail: carole.david@tip.csiro.au

Re: Polarprobe:

Dr Mike Hirshorn, Polartechnics, 02 9358 3276, ah 02 9953 9686

e-mail:Polartechnics@polartechnics.com.au

Leanne Bischof, CSIRO, mobile: 0417 293 002

After 6 October 1999 02 9325 3210

e-mail: Leanne.Bischof@cmis.csiro.au

http://www.polartechnics.com.au/

http://www.cmis.csiro.au/IAP/recentprojects/melanoma.htm