Time-lapsing data methods and systems

• US 8,831,300 B2
• Filed: 07/25/2008
• Issued: 09/09/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/02/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ventrk LLC
• Original Assignee: The Invention Science Fund I, L.L.C. (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Inventors: Allen, Paul G., Jung, Edward K. Y., Levien, Royce A., Malamud, Mark A., Rinaldo, John D. Jr.
• Primary Examiner(s): Bella, Matthew
• Assistant Examiner(s): BROOKS, JULIAN D
• Application Number:
  US12/220,671
• Publication Number:
  US 20090016585A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,237 Days
• Field of Search: 382/128, 382/131, 705/2, 705/3, 353/50, 353/77, 353/98
• US Class Current: 382/128
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0013 Medical image data A61B1/00011, A61B6/56, A61B8/56 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0079 using mirrors, i.e. for self-examination
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/107 Measuring physical dimensions, e.g. size of the entire body or parts thereof
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1072 measuring distances on the body, e.g. measuring length, height or thickness A61B5/1076 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/445 Evaluating skin irritation or skin trauma, e.g. rash, eczema, wound, bed sore
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7435 Displaying user selection data, e.g. icons in a graphical user interface
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 30/20 for handling medical images, e.g. DICOM, HL7 or PACS
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/41 Structure of client; Structure of client peripherals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4135 external recorder interface circuits between an apparatus for recording television signals and a television receiver H04N5/775
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4325 by playing back content from the storage medium reproduction of recorded television signals H04N5/76; reproduction of recorded television signals H04N9/79
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4334 Recording operations recording of a television signal H04N5/76; arrangements for recording or accumulating broadcast information or broadcast-related information H04H60/27
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44008 involving operations for analysing video streams, e.g. detecting features or characteristics in the video stream arrangements characterised by components specially adapted for monitoring, identification or recognition of video in broadcast systems H04H60/59
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/472 End-user interface for requesting content, additional data or services; End-user interface for interacting with content, e.g. for content reservation or setting reminders, for requesting event notification, for manipulating displayed content end-user interfaces for retrieving video data from a database G06F16/739; network services for supporting unicast streaming H04L65/612
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8153 comprising still images, e.g. texture, background image
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/84 Generation or processing of descriptive data, e.g. content descriptors systems specially adapted for using meta-information in broadcast systems H04H60/73
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/765 Interface circuits between an apparatus for recording and another apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 9/8205 involving the multiplexing of an additional signal and the colour video signal

Abstract

Time-lapsing mirror methods and related systems.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

an image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror;

an image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device; and

an image sequencing engine (i) operably couplable to said image playback device and (ii) configurable to present at least a part of the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror in a time-lapse context.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one of a plane mirror, a convex mirror, or a concave mirror within at least one field of view of at least one image capture device associated with said image storage device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one digital mirror within at least one field of view of at least one image capture device associated with said image storage device.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one physical mirror within at least one field of view of at least one image capture device associated with said image storage device.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one partially silvered mirror within at least one field of view of at least one image capture device associated with said image storage device.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

a wireless phone having a camera operably couplable with said image storage device.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

said image playback device operably couplable with an input capture device operably couplable with a medical expert system.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein said image playback device operably couplable with an input capture device operably couplable with a medical expert system further comprises:

said input capture device operably couplable with a robotic medical expert system.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein said image playback device operably couplable with an input capture device operably couplable with a medical expert system further comprises:

said input capture device operably couplable with a processing system accessible by a human medical expert.

10. The system of claim 7, wherein said image playback device operably couplable with an input capture device operably couplable with a medical expert system further comprises:

said image playback device operably couplable with a processing system resident within a medical expert'"'"'s place of practice.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

said image playback device operably couplable with an image recognition engine operably couplable with a medical expert system.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

said image playback device operably couplable with an image sorting engine operably couplable with a medical expert system.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

a physical link between said image playback device and said image storage device.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

a wireless link between said image playback device and said image storage device.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

a light generation device.

16. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

an image presentation device.

17. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

a laser device.

18. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one of an external drive, a wireless network component, or a wired network component.

19. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one image recognition engine operably couplable with said image playback device.

20. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one image sorting engine operably couplable with said image playback device.

21. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one image capture device operably couplable with said image playback device.

22. The system of claim 21, wherein said at least one image capture device operably couplable with said image playback device further comprises:

at least one image representation capture device located to capture a field of view of a mirror.

23. The system of claim 21, wherein said at least one image capture device operably couplable with said image playback device further comprises:

at least one image representation capture device alignable relative to a field of view of a mirror.

24. The system of claim 21, wherein said at least one image capture device operably couplable with said image playback device further comprises:

at least two image representation capture devices alignable relative to a field of view of a mirror.

25. The system of claim 21, wherein said at least one image capture device operably couplable with said image playback device further comprises:

at least one wireless image representation capture device.

26. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one input capture device operably couplable with said image playback device.

27. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

at least one image registration engine operably couplable with said image playback device.

28. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

the at least one handheld mirror forming at least a part of a physical-mirror system having at least one of an at least one image capture device, an image playback device, or said image storage device, the physical-mirror system configured to;

(a) provide the ability to do presentation on regions that both are and are not readily visually coordinated with an original field of view of a mirror, wherein the ability to do presentation on regions that are both are and are not readily visually coordinated with an original field of view of a mirror includes at least one of;

(i) an ability to zoom in on a region of an image;

or

(ii) an ability to see a time-lapse sequence of images representative of changes in a zoomed-in region.

29. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to store at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

at least one physical mirror within at least one field of view of at least one image capture device associated with said image storage device, said at least one physical mirror located in a patient'"'"'s home remote from a medical facility.

30. The system of claim 7, wherein said image playback device operably couplable with an input capture device operably couplable with a medical expert system further comprises:

at least one of said image playback device or said image storage device configured to recognize, responsive to one or more inputs captured by the input capture device, at least one anchor point associated with at least a part of an image of the patient.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein said at least one of said image playback device or said image storage device configured to recognize, responsive to one or more inputs captured by the input capture device, at least one anchor point associated with at least a part of an image of the patient further comprises:

said recognizing including at least recognizing at least one anchor point of at least one zoomed-in region of at least one image corresponding with at least one anchor point of at least one unzoomed image of the patient.

32. The system of claim 1, wherein said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

said image storage device configured to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a patient, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the patient is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror configured to reflect at least some visible light rays.

33. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

said image playback device configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image including at least one of a medical expert providing input via at least one of sound, touch, or gestures, said at least one of sound, touch, or gestures associated with at least a part of an image of at least a portion of the patient.

34. The system of claim 33, wherein said image playback device configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image including at least one of a medical expert providing input via at least one of sound, touch, or gestures, said at least one of sound, touch, or gestures associated with at least a part of an image of at least a portion of the patient further comprises:

said image playback device configurable to present a zoomed-in image of the patient responsive to a medical expert touching a displayed representation of a portion of the patient depicted within the image of the patient, said representation displayed via at least a touch screen operably coupled with said image playback device.

35. The system of claim 1, wherein said image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device further comprises:

said image playback device configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image including at least one of a medical expert specification including one or more reference values related to at least a part of an image of at least a portion of a patient.

36. The system of claim 35, wherein said image playback device configurable to present responsive to a medical expert specification related to at least a part of an image including at least one of a medical expert specification including one or more reference values related to at least a part of an image of at least a portion of a patient further comprises:

said image playback device configurable to present an alert responsive to a medical expert specification, including at least presenting said alert when at least one feature depicted within at least one image of at least a portion of the patient exceeds one or more reference values, said one or more reference values associated with the medical expert specification.

37. A system comprising:

an image storage device configurable to receive at least one historical image of at least a part of a person, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the person is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror;

an image playback device (i) configurable to present responsive to an expert specification related to at least a part of an image and (ii) operably couplable to said image storage device; and

an image sequencing engine (i) operably couplable to said image playback device and (ii) configurable to present at least a part of the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the person associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror in a time-lapse context.

38. The system of claim 37, wherein the expert further comprises:

at least one of a mechanical expert, an electrical expert, a medical expert, or a biological expert.

39. A method comprising:

receiving at least one historical image of at least a part of a person, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the person is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror;

playing back at least one image responsive to an expert specification related to at least a part of an image; and

presenting at least a part of the at least one stored historical image of the at least the part of the person associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror in a time-lapse context,

wherein at least one of the receiving, playing back or presenting is at least partially implemented in hardware.

40. The method of claim 39, wherein receiving at least one historical image of at least a part of a person, wherein the at least one historical image of the at least the part of the person is associated with capture by at least one handheld mirror further comprises:

receiving from at least one of one or more local data stores, one or more remote data stores, or via one or more network connections, the at least one historical image.