Granted Patent B2

US 8,849,679 · App. 12/277,842 · Granted Sep 30, 2014

Abstract

Claims (23)

1. A remote controlled robot system, comprising:

a robot with a robot monitor, and a robot camera that captures a patient image of a patient, said robot having an auxiliary video port, said robot including a microphone and a speaker;

a medical image device that is coupled to said auxiliary video port and can capture a medical image of a patient; and,

a remote control station that has a microphone and a speaker and transmits commands to control said robot, said remote control station includes a control station camera that captures a medical image of a medical personnel and a control station monitor that displays a display user interface, said display user interface simultaneously displays the patient image captured by said robot camera in a robot view field, said medical personnel image in a station view field, and said medical image in an auxiliary view field, wherein a doctor located at said remote control station can conduct a video conference with a technician located at said robot while viewing the patient image and the medical image.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein said medical image device is an ultrasound device.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein said medical image device is an otoscope.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein said medical image device is an echocardiogram.

5. The system of claim 1 , further comprising a broadband network coupled to said robot and said remote control station.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein said robot camera and said robot monitor are mechanically coupled to always move together.

7. The system of claim 1 , wherein a larger portion of a network bandwidth is allocated for the medical image than the patient image.

8. A method for reviewing images of a patient, comprising:

moving a robot that has a microphone, a speaker, a monitor and a camera adjacent to a patient with commands from a remote control station that includes a microphone, a speaker, a camera and a monitor;

capturing a patient image of a patient with the robot camera;

transmitting the patient image to the remote control station;

displaying the patient image on the remote control station monitor;

moving a medical image device relative to a patient by a technician;

capturing a medical personnel image of the patient with the medical image device, the captured medical image being provided to the robot;

transmitting the medical image from the robot to the remote control station;

capturing a medical personnel image of a medical personnel with a remote control station camera;

displaying the medical image on a display user interface of the remote control station monitor simultaneously with the display of the patient image and the remote station medical personnel image; and, conducting a video conference between the technician and a doctor, while the doctor views the medical image and the patient image.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the medical image device captures ultrasound images.

10. The method of claim 8 , further comprising selecting a graphical input of a graphical user interface displayed by the remote control station monitor to display the medical image.

11. The method of claim 8 , wherein the medical image is transmitted at a higher frame rate than the patient image.

Assignments (10)