CIMIT blog

Young Kids at High Risk of Traumatic Brain Injury

Imagine: you take your child to the playground, watch her climb up the tallest slide, and on the way down she loses her balance and slips off hitting her head, hard. You rush to your daughter, but she doesn’t cry; you immediately know something is terribly wrong. Severe injury to her brain has induced a coma, and potentially changed her life forever.

A traumatic brain injury (TBI) occurs every 16 seconds nationwide, making brain injury the most frequent cause of disability and death under the age of 35. Of the 1.7 million Americans who sustain a TBI annually, over half are children, 275,000 are hospitalized, and 52,000 die.

Children mend fairly easily, though not when it comes to TBI. Children’s skulls are only 1/8 as strong as that of adults, making children especially vulnerable to injury. Fortunately, there is promising, cutting-edge research in the field of TBI treatment and rehabilitation.

The TBI and Neurotrama Program within CIMIT is dedicated to the development of new and innovative treatments for patients and families. Each day, the use of robotics, virtual reality and gaming, data analysis and functional MRIs, allow doctors and researchers to gain a better understanding of TBI and its effects on the patients as well as the endless web of individuals touched by tragedy.

The good news is awareness about traumatic brain injury is increasing – through continuous efforts of national organizations like the Brain Injury Association of America and Department of Defense millions have been dedicated to protecting against these potentially life-threatening injuries. Additional support and funding comes from the NFL Players Association committee whose goal is to address diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of brain injuries, and the long-term cumulative effects of isolated or repetitive TBI.

Because TBI cannot be cured, steps must be taken to prevent an injury from occurring. The recent death of actress Natasha Richardson induced by a fall while skiing on a beginner trail raises awareness of the subtle yet fatal dangers of TBI. Our returning wounded warriors from Afghanistan and Iraq are further reminders that helmets and seatbelts cannot protect everyone. It is time to learn more about diagnosing and treating all TBI patients – soldiers, athletes and children too.

Robert Langer Gives Advice to Inventors

Robert Langer, PhD, David H. Koch Institute Professor at MIT, is a leader in novel drug delivery. On Tuesday, July 20, at the CIMIT Summer Education Series on Emerging Technologies and Applications for Therapeutic Delivery of Drugs and Molecules, we'll hear about his exciting work. Here, Dr. Langer shares with scientists and investigators his advice for inventors.

CIMIT Summer Education Series 2010
Emerging Technologies and Applications for Therapeutic Delivery of Drugs and Molecules

Tuesdays in July: July 6, 13, 20, 27, 2010
4:00-6:00PM

Where:
Location: Boston University Photonics Center
8 Saint Mary's St., Boston
Colloquium Room, Room 906

Learn more about the Series.

 

CIMIT Prize for Primary Healthcare 2010 Winners

The CIMIT Prize for Primary Healthcare is a national competition open to graduate and undergraduate engineering students. One goal of the CIMIT Prize is to challenge engineers, early in their careers, to consider healthcare as a career option. The competition seeks ideas for technologic innovations with great potential to support and catalyze improved delivery of healthcare at the frontlines of medicine.

CIMIT solicited pre-proposals in the fall of 2009 for this competition. Ten finalists were chosen in February and awarded $10,000 to develop a final proposal. CIMIT is pleased to announce the 2010 Prize winners.

Top prize and $150,000 has been awarded to the project, "Rapid Multiplexed Detection of Pathogens with DNA Nanobarcodes". Mark R. Hartman, a Cornell University PhD candidate in Biological and Environmental Engineering will lead the team chosen to receive the $150,000 top honor.  The novel technology offers the promise of a one-step quick point-of-care test for an array of pathogens possibly responsible for pharyngitis.  This diagnostic tool would allow timely and accurate triage of sore throats.

Second place and $100,000 is awarded to another Cornell-based, student-led team for their project that uses continuous ultrasound therapy for more efficient help in managing chronic pain.  Beyond the initial use of pain-management drugs, patients with chronic conditions such as osteoarthritis and sciatica are most often referred for periodic short therapy treatments with ultrasound.  The $100,000 award will support clinical evaluation of “Wearable Low-Intensity Ultrasound Therapy".  Led by George K. Lewis, Jr., a doctoral candidate in Biomedical Engineering, the team's hypothesis is that this wearable technology, which would deliver low-power ultrasound to promote pain relief and even healing, could be dispensed as a disposable device at the front lines of primary care, where diagnosis warrants.

And, recognized with the $50,000 third prize is "Cardiocam:  Technology for Non-Contact Multi-Parameter Physiologic Measurements".  Led by Ming-Zher Poh, a MIT-HST doctoral candidate in the Media Lab, this project has pilot data showing that they can capture some physiologic data purely by image analysis over the internet from a web-cam looking at a patient's face.  Already, the team has captured heart-rate with great accuracy, during ordinary video-conferencing remote interactions.   Respiratory rate and blood oxygenation are their next two goals.  This approach correlates well with the evolving paradigm of offering more primary care through outreach and by delivering care at the right time, in the right place and if possible, without requiring office visits. 

Read the full announcement posted on cimit.org.

Also, join our CIMIT Prize email list to receive notice of future Request for Applications (next RFA will be in late Fall of 2010).