iPhone is "Eye-Phone" for Pediatric Eye Surgeons in India

Narayana Nethralaya Pilots Breakthrough Telemedicine on iPhone in Quest to End Blindness in Children

Narayana Nethralaya Postgraduate Institute of Ophthalmology, Bangalore has helped evolve a unique tele-medicine software which allows screening of rural and semi-urban infants for a potentially blinding condition called Retinopathy of Prematurity along with other common conditions including ocular cancers.

The Condition

“Retinopathy of Prematurity is the leading cause of preventable infant blindness worldwide. In India, over 8% of 27 million births each year are at risk of this potentially blinding condition. Roughly if 100 ‘at-risk’ infants are screened, 15-20% may require treatment that can prevent blindness. This requires a fast and efficient system of screening infants especially in the peripheral rural areas where expertise is lacking”, said Dr Anand Vinekar, Project Co-Ordinator & Pediatric Retinal Surgeon, Narayana Nethralaya, Bangalore.

"ROP requires treatment after diagnosis within 48 to 72 hours to prevent blindness. The problem in India is that the country has about 15 to 20 doctors trained to diagnose and treat patients with ROP, and they are located in the cities," Vinekar added.

The Solution

Laboratory assistants take pictures of the retinas of prematurely born babies and transmit them via broadband to pediatric eye surgeons, who could be hundreds or thousands of miles away.

These surgeons, using iPhones, enlarge the images and using the iPhone's graphics capabilities determine whether the baby needs immediate help.

"We wanted a standard platform and the iPhone proved to be the best. With other (GSM) handsets you find that different models have different features. With a Nokia for instance, you have many models which do or do not have all the features we need. So it was easy to standardize on the iPhone. The iPhone's large screen, resolution, graphics capabilities and features offered the good picture quality doctors require, and security in the form of easy-to-publish Adobe software -- which also helps to upload patient records immediately and securely," Vinekar said.

In addition to the graphics processing capabilities that the chip industry has provided through the iPhone, it is chipping in with the software used in treating RoP. This comes from i2i Telesolutions, a startup launched by an ex-Texas Instruments India executive, Sham Banerji.

"The iPhone's pinch-and-drag capabilities, apart from its amazing resolution, are unrivaled in other phone models and the surgeons therefore decided that this is best-suited for this kind of application," Banerji said. 

In India alone, thousands of children go blind every year. These numbers could fall as a result of efforts by Vinekar and others like him, along with the help of the government.

Currently, Vinekar, with surgeons such as Anna Ills of Calgary, Canada, are joining with regional governments and non-governmental bodies to use the broadband and the iPhone to fight blindness in newborns everywhere in the world.