Doctors used VR to map Teegan’s entire ribcage and organs (Picture: CNN)
Doctors in Miami announced that they performed a first-of-its-kind operation on a baby using the lo-tech VR device Google Cardboard, Metro reports. According to the report, Teegan, a four-month-old girl from Minnesota, was born with only one lung and half a heart.
Doctors initially told her parents, Cassidy and Chad Lexcen, that her situation was hopeless. However, the parents refused to give up on their baby.
They contacted Dr Redmond Burke, chief of cardiovascular surgery at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami, after seeing him on a list of ’20 most innovative paediatric surgeons alive today’.
Dr Burke used the google cardboard for a historic feat
The new medical team had never seen a condition like Teegan’s before, but they began thinking of ways they could help her out.
Dr Burke’s main obstacle was getting to Teegan’s heart – which was out of position in her chest – without causing serious damage to her fragile body.
One way to overcome this was to make a 3D model of Teegan’s heart, and plan the surgery before doing it. However, their 3D printer had broken down, so they decided to try Google Cardboard.
Virtual Reality allowed him to visualise her heart in relation to all of her other organs, making the operation much simpler.
Google Cardboard
In case you haven’t seen it, this is Google Cardboard:
It’s essentially a piece of £14 card that you fold around your smartphone to create a viewer. You then use apps on your phone to turn it into a VR device.
‘It was mind-blowing,’ Cassidy Lexcen told CNN. ‘To see this little cardboard box and a phone, and to think this is what saved our daughter’s life.’
The procedure went off without any problems, and Teegan is on her way to making a full recovery.
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