When surgeons and engineering students join forces | Hacker News Reader

When surgeons and engineering students join forces

pulse.embs.org

53 pointsrsingla7 comments

This is really amazing. They first looked into what the problem was (lack of proper-length screws for surgical procedures) and checked to see what caused it. It turned out that the problem wasn't a lack of screws in general, there was actually a surplus of screws shipped from developed countries. The problem was inventory management and knowing what size screws needed to be stocked at any given time, because there was no inventory feedback loop. Inventory management and a feedback loop are reasons why we don't have the need for on-site screw cutters in the developed world.

The solution was to engineer portable, high-quality screw cutters to cut-to-length screws they had on hand.

Would another (maybe better/easier/less complex/quicker?) way to solve this problem be to use software/internet to create the necessary feedback loop to enable proper inventory management so that they had the proper screws on hand versus having to cut down long screws?

The solution they came up with is more flexible, so they could end up with simpler (and cheaper) sourcing and inventory management overall by ordering fewer screw lengths in the first place.

I'd like to see more examples. It seems clear that there's lots of low hanging fruit with respect to engineering solutions for medical devices, surgical tools, procedures, etc. This was one cool application, but there must be other student teams from this program?

http://arbutusmedical.ca/ is another example.

Its only been going 3-4 years with ~10 students per year, so some of the ideas are still developing. And more so, I think we'll see alumni of the program do great things in the coming years.

I'd argue that hardware is more challenging for younger founders, and medical device more so - the regulatory, funding, and access to users is hard. What makes this program so good is it makes user access easy, and coaches students through 'translating' between engineering language and surgeon.

I was at UBC in the Biomedical Program the year before EiS started. Its a very strong program in medical device design, especially by including not just the engineering science, but life sciences, regulatory environment, and commercialization considerations.

Very cool example. Clear and compelling use case, well-engineered simple solution, obvious market and benefit to the world.

I took part in the pilot program. We worked with the Sterile Processing Department and OR teams to develop small modifications to the medical device reprocessing process to reduce OR contamination events in a major trauma centre. The program is only in its 4th year at the moment but traction and support is growing exponentially.

I had Tony Hodgson (who runs the BMEG program) as my senior design project supervisor last year - he's an excellent instructor in engineering (particularly biomedical) design.

I'd expect big things from the engineers coming out of this program as a result.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com