A robot, operated by health workers in Brisbane, is scanning patients’ hearts more than 1,000 kilometres away in the Queensland outback.
Sonographers sitting in a tiny room at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital (RBWH) operate a handheld controller — like those used to play computer games — to manipulate the robot on patients at Longreach, in the state’s remote central west.
The Queensland-designed remote-controlled robot, hailed as a world-first, is expected to help alleviate the tyranny of distance faced by patients living in remote, rural, and regional areas.
It’s hoped the technology will eventually eliminate the need for many outback Queenslanders to travel hundreds of kilometres to a major centre, or wait months for an outreach team, to access a — potentially lifesaving — heart ultrasound, known medically as an echocardiogram.
Echocardiography is a key diagnostic test for heart specialists, giving them images of the structural components of the heart. It enables them to diagnose conditions such as heart failure and rheumatic heart disease.
Longreach bank manager Mai Cameron had a defibrillator implanted, in Brisbane in November 2022, after heart monitoring detected a dangerously low heart rate which put her at risk of a stroke.
The defibrillator detects and corrects abnormal heart rhythms but she still requires regular heart scans to monitor the condition.
Ms Cameron said the robot meant she wouldn’t have to leave Longreach for her scans, saving her at least three days of travel and the corresponding costs.
It means she can continue caring for her dogs, Millie and Benson, rather than worrying about them while she’s away having a scan.
“Having it in Longreach, literally, I can do it on my lunch break,” she said.
“If there’s nothing that needs doing, happy days, go back to work and continue on.
“But if there is something they find, they can act so quickly.
“[The ultrasound] is being live fed to Brisbane — they’re already looking at it while you’re having it done — so if there’s anything untoward, or anything they’re not sure of, they can bring in experts then and there.”
Longreach Hospital health workers prepare the robot, place gel on the ultrasound probe and manoeuvre patients into position so a sonographer in Brisbane can perform the scan.
