Simplicity is... Zen. And it doesn't get any more simple than this: Good medicines makes for good business. In our most recent Podcast Lynn talks with Zen Chu, our resident VC, about the current economic state, healthcare reform, and the challenges of investment and business development.
Lynn spoke with Robert Thomas, MD, MMSC on 'The Science of Sleep.' Robert explains how modernization has produced a cultural disrespect for sleep, and how sleep may help prevent obesity, cardiovascular disease and neurological disorders.
Perhaps sleep, just like taking a statin, can be as much a preventive measure as it is a necessity when we show symptoms of disease. Podcast in 4min30sec.
We spoke with Dr. Trish Coffey of Path about how to develop innovative and useful devices for the developing world. Specifically, medical devices that can become sustainable parts of a communities culture. Trish explains the process behind community collaboration, choosing the right devices, and making a better female condom, or as they call it: 'the woman's condom.'
Podcast: Supervillains have been utilizing sharks with laser beams strapped to their heads for decades and now, finally, that technology has jumped species into humans. One laboratory here in Boston is utilizing infrared and near-infrared lasers to provide therapeutic relief to people suffering from Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI).
TBI now seems common in sports and on the battlefield, but it is an injury that is still not well understood.
Michael Hamblin explains the struggles of big pharma and big device to produce therapeutic solutions and how lasers might play a role in actually treating and reducing TBI's.
Dr. Bob Nguyen tells us about the Future of Surgery (Podcast in 3min)
Robotic surgery is one of the most exciting and promising areas in the
field of minimally invasive surgery. Due to recent technological
innovations, surgeons are now able to perform complex reconstructive
surgeries through small incisions. Patients undergoing robotic
procedures are having less pain, faster recovery and shorter
hospitalization. Bob Nguyen will review the evolution of robotic
surgery and highlight some novel research in the field of robotic
surgery.
Dr. Nguyen will be speaking at the weekly CIMIT Forum: 23 February 2009 from 4pm - 6pm @ Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. This even is free, open to the public, and no registration is required. For more information please visit the CIMIT.org Forum
Clinician: Jussi Saukkonen, MD, Director of the Pulmonary Clinics, West Roxbury Veterans Hospital; holds academic appointment at Boston University Medical Center; Associate Program Leader, Inhalation Technology, CIMIT
MIT Student Team: Abdul Al Husseini, Heonju Lee, Justin Negrete, Stephen Powelson and Amelia Servi
This team will discuss the design and prototyping of a low-cost portable mechanical ventilator for use in emergency transport and resource-poor environments. Breaths are delivered using automated bag-valve mask (BVM) compression. Tidal volume and number of breaths per minute are set via three user-friendly input knobs and controlled by an internal microchip. The prototype also features assist control capability and an alarm to indicate over-pressurization of the system
Rib Fracture: Articulating Tool for Endoscopic Screw Delivery
Clinician: Suresh Agarwal, MD, Chief, Section of Critical Care Medicine, and Associate Professor of Surgery, Boston University Medical Center
MIT Student Team: Dimitris Chatzigeorgiou, Michelle Lustrino, Manas Menon, Joseph Petrzelka and Clara Stefanov-Wagner
This team will describe the development of an articulating endoscopic screw driver that can be used to place screws in osteosynthetic plates during thoracoscopic surgery. The device is small enough to be used with a 12 mm trocar sleeve and transmits sufficient torque to fully secure bone screws. An articulating joint enables correct screw alignment at obtuse angles, up to 60° from the tool axis. Students will present a novel articulating joint design, wherein a flexible shaft both transmits torque and actuates the joint; antagonist force is provided by a super-elastic spring. Screws are secured against the driver blade during insertion and with a retention mechanism that can passively release the screw when it has been securely placed in the bone. The prototype has been fitted with a blade compatible with 2.0 and 2.3 mm self-drilling screws, though a different driver blade or drill bit can easily be attached. Efficacy of the tool is demonstrated by securing an osteosynthetic plate to a rib in a mock surgical setup. This tool enables minimally invasive, thoracoscopic rib fixation.
Wheelchair Locomotion: Hybrid Lever and Push-Rim Powered Mobility Aid
Clinician: C. Keith Ozaki, MD, FACS, Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School; Director, Vascular Surgery Research and Director of Resident Research, Department of Surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
MIT Student Team: Eric Gilbertson, Ben Pope, Steffen Reichert and Jon Ward
Many users of traditional wheelchairs develop overuse injuries of the shoulder joint due to repetitive identical loading. This team proposes a wheelchair design that will solve the ergonomic challenges presented, while maintaining the maneuverability of traditional push-rim wheelchairs. By activating the largest muscle groups in the upper body (i.e. pectorals and laterals) strain on the shoulder joint is reduced. The proposed design is a morphing hybrid chair; the user can travel forward over long distances with a push/pull lever-drive system, and switch to a push-rim design when indoors or needing more fine maneuverability. The most critical modules of the design were prototyped and tested. A full design was also explored and a feature set and 3D CAD geometry are proposed.
Clinician: Rajiv Gupta, MD, PhD, Director, VCT Lab and Assistant Radiologist, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital
MIT Student Team: Josh Gafford, Johannes Schneider, Greg Tao, Kat Wong and Nick Wiltsie
This team will discuss the design and development of an optical tomography setup that can be integrated with existing flat-panel Volume Computed Tomography (CT) scanners. This combination enhances the benefits of optical imaging by allowing anatomical identification, and increases the capabilities of CT imaging by revealing CT-invisible tumors using optical and fluorescence contrast. The device consists of two vertically-mounted concentric rings, with a camera and laser fixed on each respectively. Each ring is able to rotate 360 degrees, making this device the first human-scaled near-infrared optical imaging system with these capabilities. In a clinical setting, such a system provides improved methods for diagnosis of head and neck cancer. Within the pre-clinical setting, this system provides more understanding of tumor physiology in mouse models of cancers.
Clinician: Frank Pigula, MD, Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, Associate in Cardiac Surgery and Clinical Director of the Cardiac Surgery Program, Children’s Hospital Boston; CIMIT Site Miner, Children's Hospital Boston
MIT Student Team: Davide Dal Pozzo, Martin Deterre, Damien Eggenspieler and Maxim Lobovsky
Every year, some 2000 babies are born with a defective, oversized pulmonary artery and which require constrictive banding in order to establish a good balance between systemic and pulmonary blood flows. Installing or changing the setup of the banding requires an open chest surgery and during the first 6 months of the patient’s life, physiological parameters evolve rapidly, resulting in need for frequent reoperations. Mortality for those treated patients may be as high as 10 to 20%. While many devices have been patented, none of them have been adopted due to size, adjustability, or reliability constraints with regard to implantation in newborns. This team will present the conception, design, and scale model testing of novel system for pulmonary banding of infants. This system features a hydraulic mechanical stepper actuator, which offers great advantages in both reliability and compactness. As a proof of concept, the team built a 5:1 scale working prototype that demonstrated the desired functionality of the device. Further steps involve scaling down the device to a 2:1 scale with regard to newborns so first clinical porcine trials can be started.
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