Radio Pill (1961)

Central Middlesex Hospital, London. C/U of several ’radio pills’ on a tray; extreme C/U of a pill in someone’s fingers; a tiny black stopper is removed from the pill and a piece of tape is stuck over the hole. Commentator tells us the pill, “when swallowed, transmits information about abdominal ailments hitherto unobtainable“. In a room at the hospital where various pieces of machinery are set up, a female patient in a dressing gown sits on a bed. A nurse hands the radio pill and some water to the patient, who swallows it, then lies down on the bed. The doctor (who has been tinkering with some radio transmission machinery in the background) crouches beside the woman and presses on her stomach several times. We hear the radio pill giving off a high pitched whine, which gives information about internal pressure changes. C/Us of the graph machine recording the signal; the revolving aerial spinning round. The doctor examines an x-ray of a stomach, and draws a circle round the pill which is clearly s