Patients will have to breathe in and out, while doctors use MP3 players instead of the traditional Stethoscope in the coming future.
Researchers from the University of Alberta, Canada, claim that MP3 players can replace the Stethoscope. Bill Hodgetts, an audiologist and Neil Skjodt, one of the researchers are testing whether the music player can help doctors to record respiratory sounds by pressing their in-built microphones directly to the patient’s chest.
Neil Skjodt said, “The quality, clarity and purity of the loud sounds were better than I have ever heard with a stethoscope.” After recording the heart beats, doctors can store and sent to a specialist. These records and further can be analyzed using more sophisticated software. Moreover, these records can also be added to a patient’s files for future reference.
Skjodt tested respiratory specialists in training to see if they had more accurate results with lung sounds recorded on an MP3 player. He found out that they were better at recognizing common combinations of breath sounds and wheezing using the device. However, more subtle sounds were still a problem.
For reference, Skjodt and Hodgetts would provide the recording to the subjects that carry a library of chest sounds in MP3 format to differentiate one from another. They are also studying whether the devices could help doctors to listen to heart and bowel sounds as well.
So, let us just lie down and let doctors do their testing with the new innovative device.
