At CIMIT we talk a lot about collaboration and here is an interesting TED on that. Just thought everyone here would enjoy this very clear history and explanation of collaborative "wealth." Get past the mild weirdness of the presenter and you'll be set!
Integrated Sleep Stability: Dynamic Mapping of Sleep Oscillations in
Health and Disease Robert Thomas, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine
at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center,
rthomas1@bidmc.harvard.edu Moderator: Ary L. Goldberger, MD, Director, The Margret
& H. A. Rey Institute for Nonlinear Dynamics in Medicine (ReyLab),
BIDMC; Program Director, Research Resource for Complex Physiologic Signals,
agoldber@caregroup.harvard.edu
Traditional approaches to sleep physiology
utilize a graded methodology: characterizing increasing depths of non-REM
or type (REM vs. non-REM). Dr. Thomas will present a new method: mapping
integrated / coupled sleep oscillations, using a single channel of ECG.
The resultant "sleep spectrogram" is rich in "hidden"
biological information. He will present and discuss several examples,
including tracking interactions of chemoreflex control with upper airway
mechanics in sleep apnea. The ease of recording ambulatory ECG allows
for repeat testing and dynamic tracking of physiology in health and
disease.
Modeling the Dynamics of Sleep
Using State Space Analysis Tom Scammell, MD, Associate Professor of Neurology
at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center,
tscammel@bidmc.harvard.edu Moderator: Clifford B. Saper, MD, PhD, James Jackson
Putnam Professor of Neurology, HMS; Chairman, Department of Neurology,
BIDMC, csaper@bidmc.harvard.edu
Sleep disorders such as insomnia, sleep apnea, and narcolepsy affect
about 30% of the population and substantially impair driving, school
and work performance, and many other facets of life. Sleep and wake
states are complex, and our understanding of sleep and sleep disorders
is limited by current sleep research techniques. Dr. Scammell will describe
a new state / space analysis technique based upon spectral characteristics
of the electroencephalogram that provides useful perspectives on the
causes of sleepiness in narcolepsy and other sleep disorders.
Eliot Massie passed along this video and it has served its purpose to evoke thought. Since this is the CIMIT 'Education' blog I thought it an appropriate place to let things spill out onto the pavement.
Putting my comments from experience in filmmaking aside, the video does raise interesting questions that most young people will… Well, scoff at. However, they may serve as an eye opening appeal to older generations. People in university or less than a decade out know these problems because we lived them everyday for years. We learned to cope and to us they are not problems as much as they are simply the way things are. Now, that does not mean it doesn't need to change. If things changed to be more adaptive and up to date with technology and the "multi-tasking" student education would be more productive for all sides. The fact is that students today do not fit in with the establishment around them. This new way of living, working and learning doesn't connect with the way old gray beards are teaching and the formats schools are providing.
Does it make sense that a student spends hundred of thousands of dollars on an education that only fits a small percentage of who they are, what they want and will hardly apply to their real world job skill? No. But this has always been a problem. This has always been the argument of naïve students who only want to focus on their interests and care not for a well rounded education. However, the argument is not against a well rounded education based in what is proven to work. It is that the current state of education forsakes almost all new improvements. What I'm sensing more and more is that students just out of college are being virtually destroyed by the real world. While the real world continues to keep pace with these new ways of living, education does not. To survive in the large institutions created by universities you have to play by their rules. And these rules are becoming more and more disconnected from the rest of the world and more disconnected from the jobs students want to attain. More disconnected from the lives that all students lead when not in the classroom.
Would a student come to class more often if the classroom fit their life? I don't know.
Students do not need computer labs and wireless Internet as much as they need curriculum that matches those tools. A computer is a tool and at first it was a great help in accomplishing the tasks originally set forth by education. Now, the computers ability and the users ability have far surpassed what they are being challenged with. And thus the computer has become a very expensive typewriter. Why does education not see that the opportunities opened by technology need content. An educator and an institution must be able to provide content, surrounds and serve as a guide for learning that match the tools and styles of a student. Currently, they fail.
A good friend of mine who is working on her PhD is forbidden to use the Internet in researching for her graduate classes. Is this because the Internet is unreliable? Because the professors want students to learn the old ways? Or is it simply because the professors are afraid to learn the new ways? What if instead of a twenty page paper a student turned in a very carefully researched, prepared, written and interesting twenty-hour podcast? With all the same sources, interviews, editing, selection of language and care taken? What if that twenty-hour podcast not only gave you everything you would get in a twenty page paper, but was also more interesting, thought provoking, mobile and useful to this generation?
Lynn brought up a great point of the video creating sides. The presumption that the conflict is The Students v. The Educators. What if we educated one another? Professors teach students the proven and time tested curriculum, formats and rituals while also being taught how they can be flexible and applied to a new technology.
Just caught this newer TED talk and thought it could really apply to how we look at prosthetics and their developments. Of course there are all sorts of robot development programs like FIRST and perhaps this program could further FIRST away from games and into Medicine.
One of our PI's recent publications online referenced a video article on Jove: Journal of Visualized Experiments. It is a novel approach for journal research.
CIMIT Forum: Cardiac Device Development Forum Moderator: James E. Muller, MD, CEO, InfraReDx, Inc, jmuller@infraredx.com
Convergence in Health Care Technology: Devices, Biologics, Pharma, IT, Communications and Imaging Stephen N. Oesterle, MD, Senior Vice President, Medicine & Technology, Medtronic, Inc., stephen.n.oesterle@medtronic.com
The medical device industry remains a vibrant participant in the delivery of health care in the 21st century, but will necessarily evolve to incorporate the myriad important advances in biologics, information, imaging and communication technologies and systems. Medical devices have largely been used as palliative instruments. Implanted electro-mechanical devices have been designed to alleviate the symptoms of chronic and degenerative diseases. Therapeutic proteins, cell therapies, interference RNA and gene manipulation fall within the rubric of “biologics” and offer a realistic approach to restoration and cure for many of the same degenerative and chronic diseases that have been the focus of device therapy. In contrast to small molecules, biologics cannot be ingested. They require targeted and controlled delivery. Combination devices—biologics delivered by devices such as catheters and pumps--will define many therapies in the next decade.
Information and communication technology will be catalyzed with devices. Implanted sensors will communicate not only in closed loop systems with devices but externally with hand held communication sets that will allow physicians to remotely monitor and control the care of patients with chronic diseases such as heart failure, diabetes and hypertension. Pre-operative and intra-operative imaging will accelerate less and less invasive diagnosis and treatment for cardiac, orthopaedic and neurological intervention with medical devices.
Challenges in Cardiac Device Development Donald S. Baim, MD, Executive Vice President, Chief Medical and Scientific Officer, Boston Scientific, donald.baim@bsci.com
Cardiovascular Devices have revolutionized the treatment of coronary artery disease over the past 30 years. Device development, including the introduction of newer modalities such as stents, atherectomy, and now drug-eluting stents, have made progressive improvements in procedure applicability (now 3/4 of all revascularization), procedure success (now 98%), procedure safety (now <1% major complications), and durability (freedom from restenosis now >95%). The large number of procedures (> 1 million/year) and associated revenues (>$ 8 billion) have fueled this development.
Against these impressive gains, the challenges to drug-eluting stent safety and appropriate procedure use (versus medical, surgical, or bare metal stents) over the last 18 months have for the first time caused a 5% contraction in the PCI market, and a 20% drop in DES use. At the same time, FDA requirements have increased the size, complexity, and cost of clinical trials for new devices. Even as this contracted market starts to recover, it is being divided among new competitors, and faced with greater regulatory burdens (after this year, there will be probably be no new DES until 2012) challenging the ability to continue the pace of progress.
A non-profit consortium of Boston's leading teaching hospitals and universities, CIMIT fosters interdisciplinary collaboration among world-class experts in translational research, medicine, science and engineering, in concert with industry, foundations and government, to rapidly improve patient care through the discovery, development and implementation of innovative medical devices, procedures and clinical technology system applications.
