GIGXR launches AR tool designed for medical training.
GIGXR, a company focused on creating powerful instructor-led XR training tools for use by medical training experts, higher education, and the Department of Defense, has announced the launch of two brand new applications that will improve how the medical field approaches hands-on training during COVID-19 and beyond, HoloPatient Remote and GIG Mobile.
HoloPatient Remote is an extension of HoloPatient, a tool used in traditional classroom settings that allows students to examine a realistic AR patient with their instructor via a Microsoft’s HoloLens headset. HoloPatient Remote expands on the existing AR learning experience, allowing students to access AR content at home or on the go. Instead of a HoloLens, however, students view the content through a mobile device or tablet.
Key features of HoloPatient Remote according to GIGXR:
- Remote and/or socially distanced student groups connect with their instructor, who is wearing a Microsoft HoloLens 2 mixed reality headset, using their iOS or Android device.
- High-quality, real-life holographic standardized patients are transported to the student location during the session.
- Students use the mixed reality features of their iOS or Android device to select a location in their room for the standardized patient to sit, stand, or lie down for examination.
- Students can independently walk around, examine, and interact with the holographic patient while communicating with their instructor through VOIP.
- Students can observe a wide variety of patient pathologies, conditions, and states of decline chosen and highlighted by the instructor for the session.
- Collaborative learning among the group facilitates highly effective learning outcomes.
GIG Mobile is a native Android and iOS app that controls HoloPatient Remote and allows you to interact with GIGXR’s GIG Immersive Learning System, an XR education tool designed to enhance current curriculums and teaching methods by building a more powerful learning environment for both the student and the instructor.
Key features of GIG Mobile according to GIGXR:
- Instructors can create a session template of content that is replicable and can be assigned to specific student groups.
- Students can join training sessions remotely for applications such as HoloPatient.
- Data collection around changes made by users made in a session, such as vital signs and remote labels that are placed in the scene.
- QR code login that is rapid and seamless, with sessions that are launched by instructors and accessed by students with one click of a button.
“While students are required to stay safe and socially distanced, GIGXR’s HoloPatient is the closest, highest-quality learning experience you can get to training with real patients,” said Dr. Linda Herrmann, NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing, in an official press release. “GIGXR’s use of volumetric 3D video to capture standardized patients creates pathology experiences that are unimaginably life-like for physically safe and safe-to-fail environments. Enabling students to hear, see and interact with holographic culturally diverse patients, and each other, provides some of the most cutting-edge and effective teaching and training modalities in our field.”
Hands-on training is essential when it comes to the healthcare field. In a recent study published by the NCSBN, clinical simulation represents as much as 50% of training for nursing students. Because of COVID-19 and the lockdown, however, traditional in-person classrooms aren’t exactly the safest options for students and educators at the moment.
Because of this, the medical field continues to seek out innovative ways to help train our next generation of doctors, nurses, and medical assistants that isn’t Zoom or Skype.
“Guidelines around how instructors teach and engage with their students, whether online or on campus, are shifting daily. Most are ending up with a hybrid model at best while still needing tools that optimize learning” added David King Lassman, CEO and founder of GIGXR. Lassman goes on to say, “This is especially challenging for fields that benefit from in-person, immersive training such as healthcare, where standardized patient training can’t be taught effectively over Zoom. We developed HoloPatient Remote and GIG Mobile so students can complete and even accelerate simulation training, in many cases meeting graduation requirements.”
HoloPatient Remote and GIG Mobile are just two of the latest tools that have been released to help the medical field during the pandemic. This past September we saw the launch of FundamentalVR’s Fundamental Surgery platform, which uses VR and haptic feedback to deliver realistic training to students. Companies such as Spatial, WarpVR, and Foundry45 have also been providing their own remote training and collaboration solutions through their respective AR and VR platforms.
GIGXR can be found in academic institutions such as NYU, Ursuline, University of Pennsylvania, Bucks County Community College, Presbyterian Health Services, Creighton University, College of Lake County, Buckeye Hills Career Center in the United States; University of Canberra, TAFE Queensland, Flinders University, Otago Polytechnic, Southern Institute of Technology, Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi in Australasia; University of Leeds in the United Kingdom.
You can find HoloPatient Remote and GIG Mobile as bundled applications available in the iOS App or Google Play Stores. These apps are free to students and instructors of institutions who license the Immersive Learning System and HoloPatient application. With the announcement of HoloPatient Remote, a discounted starter package is available to institutions that purchase during the fall term.
For more information on HoloPatient Remote, GIG Mobile and the GIG Immersive Learning System, visit www.gigxr.com or email sales@gigxr.com to request a demo.
Image Credit: GIGXR
