Photograph by Tim Parker
One of the latest breakthroughs in medical science is emphatically old–school in its methods for helping cardiologists give the OK for major surgery.
A study reported by the Wall Street Journal found that common items could help doctors determine if a patient is strong enough to survive surgery, as well as help patients and their families understand the risks involved. A bent paper clip, for instance, can measure nerve impairment, and a weak handshake can shed light on whether a patient will have complications following surgery. Another test is the “eye ball test,” in which a doctor watches how easily a patient can stand and walk.
But these low–tech tests aren’t a new discovery for doctors. “These are things we physicians have done all along, but now we’re actually putting some objective science to it,” says Dr. Seiichi Noda, the director of cardiac surgery at St. Clare’s Hospital in Fenton. “For me, the ability to hold a conversation with a patient for a long time without the patient getting short of breath is very informative. And watching a patient walk into the clinic from the outside or waiting area into the examining room is very telling.”
More studies are expected to further validate the findings, but Noda believes that low–tech tests will be more prevalent in the future. “I think what we’re starting to see is a swing in the pendulum of how medical care is. For a while, it seemed like a lot of the things we were doing started getting more and more high–tech … Along with the increase in technology, there’s a substantial increase in the cost of these tests,” he says. “I think what we’re going to start seeing more and more is medicine going back a little bit to some of these very basic tests we know work, that are very inexpensive and easy to do, that give us a lot of good information.”
Although these tests can be performed with household items, Noda doesn’t recommend patients undergo them without a doctor, who can better evaluate and understand what the results say. He thinks more research will streamline the tests, which could eventually provide doctors with more knowledge.
But that doesn’t mean high–tech and expensive medical tests will cease in diagnosing patients. “[Low–tech tests] are tests you would describe as being very general—it doesn’t necessarily test for specific things,” Noda explains. “And I don’t think that a test like this is going to replace all the high–tech stuff we do. I think this is going to be another tool we can utilize.”
