Smart Glasses for Supporting Distributed Care Work: Systematic Review

Abstract

Background Over the past 2 decades, various desktop and mobile telemedicine systems have been developed to support communication and care coordination among distributed medical teams. However, in the hands-busy care environment, such technologies could become cumbersome because they require medical professionals to manually operate them. Smart glasses have been gaining momentum because of their advantages in enabling hands-free operation and see-what-I-see video-based consultation. Previous research has tested this novel technology in different health care settings. Objective The aim of this study was to review how smart glasses were designed, used, and evaluated as a telemedicine tool to support distributed care coordination and communication, as well as highlight the potential benefits and limitations regarding medical professionals’ use of smart glasses in practice. Methods We conducted a literature search in 6 databases that cover research within both health care and computer science domains. We used the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) methodology to review articles. A total of 5865 articles were retrieved and screened by 3 researchers, with 21 (0.36%) articles included for in-depth analysis. Results All of the reviewed articles (21/21, 100%) used off-the-shelf smart glass device and videoconferencing software, which had a high level of technology readiness for real-world use and deployment in care settings. The common system features used and evaluated in these studies included video and audio streaming, annotation, augmented reality, and hands-free interactions. These studies focused on evaluating the technical feasibility, effectiveness, and user experience of smart glasses. Although the smart glass technology has demonstrated numerous benefits and high levels of user acceptance, the reviewed studies noted a variety of barriers to successful adoption of this novel technology in actual care settings, including technical limitations, human factors and ergonomics, privacy and security issues, and organizational challenges. Conclusions User-centered system design, improved hardware performance, and software reliability are needed to realize the potential of smart glasses. More research is needed to examine and evaluate medical professionals’ needs, preferences, and perceptions, as well as elucidate how smart glasses affect the clinical workflow in complex care environments. Our findings inform the design, implementation, and evaluation of smart glasses that will improve organizational and patient outcomes.

Examining Workflow for Simulated Pediatric Emergency Medical Services Care

“…Prior studies examining this issue have made the same conclusion and suggest that degree of variability and multitasking in EMS teams necessitates novel interventions to support EMS providers (Chisholm 2000). For example, hands-free, semi-automated wearable technology such as smart glasses can be adopted to better support EMS workflow (Zhang 2021a(Zhang , 2021b(Zhang , 2022. Other studies demonstrate that interventions to improve teamwork11 or integrate health information technology (HIT) (Zhang 2020) can improve EMS care.…”

The Roles of Video in Online Learning

“…It also serves as a platform for visualization of educational videos such as open surgical procedures that are live streamed to encourage medical students and residents from public health centers to use the telemedicine features on their own smartphones and tablets as an educational tool. To aid online video streaming surgery observation, tiny computers called smart glasses that have an internet connection and a head-mounted monitor and video camera are used to watch professional surgeons perform surgeries in order to learn new techniques and advance existing ones [32].…”

Use of Smart Glasses (Assisted Reality) for Western Australian X-ray Operators’ Continuing Professional Development: A Pilot Study

“…Currently, the major employer of WA XROs, WA Country Health Service (WACHS), arranges radiographers from larger clinical (expert) centers to provide telephone support to their XROs practicing in smaller rural/remote centers to address these issues and as a means for the XROs' CPD. Although the telephone support is common for traditional telehealth practice [2], our previous qualitative study on WA XROs' competence, and barriers and facilitators to their radiography practice published in 2020 identified that videoconferencing (VC) support appears to be a better approach [1]. This kind of VC support for XROs was proved effective for improving quality of X-ray images produced by XROs in another Australian state (Queensland) in 2017 [3].…”

“…This kind of VC support for XROs was proved effective for improving quality of X-ray images produced by XROs in another Australian state (Queensland) in 2017 [3]. However, the major issues with the traditional VC platform such as the one used in the Queensland's XROs study [3] are a limited field of view of the fixed camera for the experts (supervising radiographers) to understand clinical situations faced by their XROs and the requirement of hand control for operating the VC equipment [2,4].…”

“…Recently, the use of smart glasses in healthcare has become popular despite its first use being reported in 2013 when Google Glass became available [2,4,5]. Smart glasses are a head-mounted computing device with wireless connectivity, a camera, a video display and a headset attached to a frame for a user to wear it like traditional eyeglasses.…”