Imagine that a top surgeon could help operate on you from 100 km away. Science fiction? Not in Leipzig! Because the Innovation Center Computer Assisted Surgery ICCAS, together with Vodafone, is leading an exciting new research project called „6G Health“. For the next three years, they and 17 other partners will be developing a framework so that medical applications based on upcoming 6G technology can enhance clinical collaboration. 6G technology is still in the development stages. But experts predict that it will combine mobile communications, sensor technology and computing power – thus enabling the integration of virtual worlds with the real world.

So what does that mean IRL for the field of healthcare? Think smart networked hospitals, or a surgeon using augmented reality to study an organ in 3D before operating on it – with the help of a colleague in another clinic. 6G-enabled devices will be able to move enormous amounts of data with almost no delay, making emergency medical care even faster. Wearable and implantable medical devices will be able to ‘communicate’ in real time, alerting patients and their healthcare providers to possible issues. 6G-enabled exoskeletons might help patients walk or nurses push heavy hospital beds. Interconnected 6G technology thus has great potential to relieve the burden on the healthcare sector – and change many patients’ quality of life for the better.

For more details, please go to live.vodafone.de (in German)

Image © Universitätsklinikum Leipzig