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There are already a number of mobile ultrasound devices, including ones that plug into phones and tablets. As someone who's actually done a few ultrasound cour

by et2o 9y ago

There are already a number of mobile ultrasound devices, including ones that plug into phones and tablets. As someone who's actually done a few ultrasound courses, depending upon what you're trying to image it's not easy. It's not just about having the device, years of medical training come into play. Also, the mobile devices have significantly lower resolution and don't seem to be super important in the hospital.

pen2l 9y ago
Yep, I've been playing with the Lumify (https://www.lumify.philips.com/web/ https://www.lumify.philips.com/web/) for a few years. I think my hospital has had it for about 5 years. From what I can gather, this new device's selling point is the price. I'm not sure how much the Lumify is, but I had the impression that it was a few thousand dollars. And there's some talk about new AI technology packed inside the new device, what that is I am not sure.
- rsingla 9y ago
  Given the regulatory process, I would envision AI along the lines of "region proposal". That is software to highlight or draw one's attention to a certain portion of the image that "may" have X or something interesting. That's in contrast to diagnosis software where it'd say this portion "is" X. I should add there are several hand-held portable ultrasound machines, like from SonoSite and Clarius, and would agree that the selling point here is the price point. To the best of my knowledge, the cost of ultrasound machines has gone down by two orders of magnitude with somewhat comparable resolutions. I believe the top-tier machines with the best image quality or resolution are still on the order of >$100k (Philips Epiq for example). The cloud software offered by Butterfly should also be interesting if done well.
russdill 9y ago
Watch the video, this thing is mobile, but has the resolution of a full size device. But yes, thinking it will be an at home device is a bit of pipe dream.

by et2o 9y ago

pen2l 9y ago

Yep, I've been playing with the Lumify (https://www.lumify.philips.com/web/ https://www.lumify.philips.com/web/) for a few years. I think my hospital has had it for about 5 years. From what I can gather, this new device's selling point is the price. I'm not sure how much the Lumify is, but I had the impression that it was a few thousand dollars. And there's some talk about new AI technology packed inside the new device, what that is I am not sure.

rsingla 9y ago
Given the regulatory process, I would envision AI along the lines of "region proposal". That is software to highlight or draw one's attention to a certain portion of the image that "may" have X or something interesting. That's in contrast to diagnosis software where it'd say this portion "is" X. I should add there are several hand-held portable ultrasound machines, like from SonoSite and Clarius, and would agree that the selling point here is the price point. To the best of my knowledge, the cost of ultrasound machines has gone down by two orders of magnitude with somewhat comparable resolutions. I believe the top-tier machines with the best image quality or resolution are still on the order of >$100k (Philips Epiq for example). The cloud software offered by Butterfly should also be interesting if done well.

russdill 9y ago

Watch the video, this thing is mobile, but has the resolution of a full size device. But yes, thinking it will be an at home device is a bit of pipe dream.