Behold the Bloodbot. It's a robot designed to draw blood from people, or scare the Goth out of needlephobes, and created by the Imperial College (London).
How does it work? According to Wired, the nightmare-inducing machine
presses a probe against the surface tissue and measures the force on the probe. The pressure difference across the area indicates the presence of a vein. Once the Bloodbot finds a vein it inserts a needle and draws the blood. The system is sophisticated and precise enough to ensure that it doesn’t insert the needle too far into the vein or overshoot the vein.
"doesn't insert the needle too far into the vein" - now that's a phrase to conjure up squirming dread.
How often does BB avoid that slip-up, overshooting the vein, and other horrible errors? Bloodbot has a 78% accuracy rate. Which is impressive, although one wonders about that 22% other:
22-percent of the time it's either needlessly stabbing you, or causing dangerous, uncontrollable bleeding.
Perhaps Ohio could use the Bloodbot? Yet another instance of Ohio Gothic, just waiting to happen.
(thanks to John Lynch)
Considering how many human phlebotomists screw this one up, it's possible the BB isn't all that bad - especially if they're testing it on more difficult to stick veins.
Posted by: Ladi | September 18, 2009 at 09:59
I will be having nightmares about this for a long time. So thanks for that.
*shudder*
Posted by: Alison | September 18, 2009 at 12:33
Yep, I've been getting blood drawn about 4 - 6 times a year for the last several years, and I'd say 78 percent accuracy is pretty good.
Of course, I live in Ohio . . . .
Posted by: HP | September 19, 2009 at 00:55
I'm pretty sure an astronaut used something like this to commit suicide in Bill Gibson's Hinterlands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinterlands_%28short_story%29)...
Posted by: Ed Webb | September 21, 2009 at 00:08
Wouldn't have William S. Burroughs loved this?
Posted by: Jim | September 21, 2009 at 01:02