Mending Hearts Via Satellite

An anonymous reader writes "Read how a cardiac surgeon and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) are engaged in a 15-month-old experiment in telemedicine, using computer software and satellite hook-ups to make available their specialist services to general practitioners treating heart patients in other parts of India."

Scared

[Cokelee]

This idea frightens me. I'd like for the doctor to be there to chastise me for years of bad eating habits --wouldn't you?

./ it!!!

[moosesocks]

Somehow, tying the slashdot effect into medicine over the internet seems like a bad idea....

my only worry

[Phosphor3k]

Would be the lag. Seriously, that'd really suck if you over-cut because of lag.

Impressive, however

[isorox]

I was more impressed with Telemedicine Link With South Pole Allows Remote Knee Surgery [nsf.gov].

Latency is a bitch

[n9hmg]

I think of surgery as a fairly high-dexterity sort of thing. Unless this is some sort of mesh networking with LEOs, we're talking about >1sec latency at best. I have enough trouble just using vi over a 750ms latency link. It's not like you can just "q!" and start over.