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Biomedical Engineering Conference 2006

 

 

Prof James O WEAR

Managing Director
Little Rock Employee Resource Center
Veterans Affairs Medical Center

"Clinical Engineering and Healthcare Technology Management"

Healthcare Technology Management should involve a team of hospital staff to assess the need for new technologies and their impact on healthcare delivery. This team should recommend the best technology for patient treatment and how it should be procured and maintained. The team should include healthcare delivery staff, hospital administrators, hospital engineers and clinical engineers. Since a new technology may be a procedure, a drug or a device, the clinical engineer must expand his education beyond devices. The clinical engineer must be aware of what is being developed in the healthcare industry and related industries to make recommendations on when to procure and how to maintain devices. He would not want to recommend something that is not proven or something that is obsolete technology.

If the technology procured is a device, then the clinical engineer has an important role in the management of that device from the time that it is installed until it is disposed of. He must also be aware of patient safety issues with the device. The clinical engineer is the bridge between education, research and industry and the delivery of healthcare involving devices.

 

 

Mr Richard Keith CLARK

Chief Executive
Medipex Ltd
NHS Innovation Hub Yorkshire & Humber

"Profitable Partnerships in Health"

The talk will be based on my own experiences of working in the UK with the National Health Service - arguably the worlds largest public health service and will focus on technology transfer, partnerships with industry and the new NHS innovation hub network by way of real examples and case studies.

Mr Don GERHARDT

President & CEO
LifeScience Alley

"The Change and Impact from the Convergence of Medical Devices and Bioscience"

Mr. Gerhardt will review a number of the directions product developments are taking as the convergence of medical device technology and bioscience technology come together. He will also explain the highly developed life science cluster in Minnesota.

 

 

Mr Albert LI

Manager and Senior Administrator Manager
Office of Medical Device Evaluation
Center for Measurement Standards
Industrial Technology Research Institute

"The Development of Medical Device Evaluation Technology in ITRI"

The involvement of biomedical engineers in medical device design and development triggers the development of ITRI in medical device regulatory science. ITRI cooperates with DOH to establish an international harmonized regulatory system as a foundation for industry development and to ensure the quality of medical device. I will share our experiences of medical device evaluation technology, medical device QS inspection and product review with the audience. Suggestions to biomedical engineering education to satisfy the industry needs will also be part of the presentation.

 

Prof Yao-Xiong HUANG

Professor
Biomedical Engineering Department
JiNan University

"Biomedical Engineering & The Third Generation of Medicine & Health Care"

The present paper describes the role of biomedical engineering in the third generation of medicine and health care, and its strategy position in fulfilling the national goal of medicine and health care in China.

 

 

Prof Keith LUK

Chair Professor and Head of Department
Division Chief, Division of Spine Surgery
Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology
Faculty of Medicine
The University of Hong Kong Hong Kong

"A Novel Spinal Implant for Progressive Scoliosis Correction"

Scoliosis is a lateral deviation of the spine. Adolescent idiopathic scoliosis affects 3.45/1,000 girls and 0.28/1,000 boys worldwide. This specific type of curve develops at the time of puberty and may progress rapidly. Severe curves if left untreated may cause cardiopulmonary dysfunction and earlier onset of low back pain in addition to the cosmetic deformity and lower self esteem. Current treatment for these severe curves is that of correction and spinal fusion with instrumentation.

A wide range of surgical instrumentation for correction of scoliosis have been developed. The spine is straightened through a combination of distraction on the concave side and compression on the convex side of the curve. Since the corrective forces are applied intraoperatively over a relative short period of time, the amount of correction achievable depends on the rigidity of the curve and is generally no better than 70%. The use of excessive force in attempting a full correction may also result in bony fractures or neurological complications.

In all biological tissues, there is a viscoelastic property which basically mean that the stress will be lower if the strain is applied slowly over a period of time. Also with stress relaxation the stress will decrease under the same strain over time.To take advantage of these properties of the spine in deformity correction, the Divison of Spine Surgery of the Department of Orthopaedics & Traumatology, the University of Hong Kong has introduced a novel spinal instrumentation for gradual scoliosis correction with the use of the 'super-elasticity' found in a special alloy called Nickel-Titanium (NiTi) shape memory alloy. Super-elasticity is a property in which after the metal is deformed, the recovery force remains constant within a range of deformation. After receiving a patented specific thermal treatment protocol, the NiTi spinal rod will become super-elastic at human body temperature, but it is also malleable at room condition at the same time. The correction force can be controlled by spinal rod diameter, different thermal treatment protocols and the composition of Ni and Ti. In animal testing, this device is proven to be effective and safe in correcting the spinal curve gradually. The HKU researchers have also successfully quantified the relationship between the pre-operative spinal flexibility and the intra-operative correction force that is needed for correction.

One of the concerns with NiTi alloy is the release of nickel ion that may result in nickel allergy. Our group together with material scientists from the Department of Physics and Materials Science of The City University of Hong Kong have developed an advance surface nanotechnology (Plasma Immersion Ion Implantation) which is able to prevent nickel ion release from the NiTi matrix. Several assessments of the plasma treated NiTi reveal that the nickel concentration on the superficial layer has been significantly suppressed. The modified alloy possesses anti-corrosion and wear resistance superior to that of untreated NiTi and other medical grade titanium alloy and stainless steel. The bio-compatibility of this surface-treated material is also better than the control samples. Clinical trial using this novel spinal implant will begin in the end of 2006.

This novel super-elastic spinal rod is expected to be able to achieve better deformity correction with lower incidence of bone failure and neurological risks.

 

 

Ir Prof Daniel CHOW

Professor
Department of Health Technology & Informatics
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

"Biomechanics of Load Carriage"

Back pain has been a severe musculoskeletal disorder worldwide. About 80% of the population will suffer from back pain at some point in their lives. Among various identified risk factors, increased mechanical load on the lumbar spine due to load carriage is one of the major causes of back injury and pain.

Increased load on the spine in manual materials handling, has been a concern. Although industrial back belt has been suggested, there are still insufficient data indicating back belt can significantly reduce biomechanical loading on the trunk during lifting or reduce back injury. Patient transfer is a still a challenge for clinical personnel. On the other hand, back pain in children and adolescents is becoming more common and it has aroused concern that back pain symptoms in childhood may have serious consequences regarding future pain in adulthood. One of the main biomechanical risk factors identified in relation to this problem is the load carried by children to and from school.

Although numerous biomechanical analyses have been conducted, load carriage is still a significant and challenging problem.

The mean reported schoolbag load in Hong Kong is over 20% of bodyweight (Hong and Cheung 2003), and the weight of the backpack and the duration of carriage have been associated with back pain

About 80% of the population worldwide will suffer from back pain at some point in their lives (Jones and Macfarlane 2005). While this is a severe and rapidly growing problem, (Negrini and Carabalona 2002, Sheir-Neiss 2003, Korovessis et al. 2005), as well as musculoskeletal deformities such as scoliosis, kyphosis and lordosis (Korovessis et al. 2005).

Several studies have therefore been conducted to address the concerns regarding backpack carriage in schoolchildren and to determine the effects of backpack carriage. This has typically been done by assessing changes in physical performance at different backpack weights. Significant changes in oxygen uptake and energy expenditure (Hong and Brueggemann 2000), cardiopulmonary parameters (Li et al. 2003), gait patterns (Hong and Brueggemann 2000) and trunk and head posture (Goodgold et al. 2002) have all been found in children carrying backpacks of between 10 and 20% bodyweight (BW). As a result, backpack loads of 10-15% BW have been recommended as safe limits for schoolchildren in line with these studies (Brackley and Stephenson 2005). However, these are based on physiological and biomechanical data which may simply represent natural adaptations to the load carried and do not bear any obvious relationship to back pain. The effects of backpack carriage on the spine itself are poorly documented. Vacheron et al. (1999) used a radiographic method and found decreasing effective intersegmental mobility at the S1, L3 and T12 spinal levels of adults carrying a 20kg pack. Orloff and Rapp (2004) found an increasingly pronounced surface curvature of the spine in mature female students using a backpack instrumented with spring-loaded rods to measure the displacement between the spine and the backpack. Korovessis et al. (2005) used a scoliometer to measure the immediate changes in spinal curvature (lumbar lordosis and thoracic kyphosis) in children when wearing their school backpack over one shoulder. No immediate changes in curvature between the loaded and unloaded conditions were found, but this is limited by the use of the scoliometer which cannot give curvatures over localized regions of the spine and is of relatively low reliability.

 

 

Dr Ricky FU

Senior Researcher
Department of Physics & Materials Science
City University of Hong Kong

"Plasma Treated Biomaterials"

The bioactivity, biocompatibility, biodegradation and bacteria disinfection of biomaterials are the key topics for materials as implants in the human body. The surface of biomaterials plays important role in the success of its applications as it directly contacts with human cells, tissues and blood. Surface modification of biomaterials becomes essential to enhance materials performance in human body. In the talk, we will present the motivations, challenges, roadmaps of the development of biomaterials and the merits of plasma surface modification of biomaterials. Undoped and doped diamond-like carbon applied in cardiovascular devices, plasma surface activation of silicon-based and titanium based materials as well as plasma treated polymeric materials for anti-bacteria will be studied.

 

 

Prof Yuan-ting ZHANG

Professor
Director of Joint Research Centre for Biomedical Engineering
Head of Division of Biomedical Engineering
The Chinese University of Hong Kong

"Telemedicine: Wearable Medical Devices and Body Sensor Networks For m-Healthcare"

Because of the increase in the aging population and the prevalence of the chronic diseases, the demand for wearable medical devices is gaining a great deal of attention to the industry everywhere in the world.

In order to monitor human health constantly without disturbing users' normal daily activities, the ideal wearable medical devices and biosensors should be designed to be so smart and autonomous that they will be operable by any individuals from a child to an aged person for their own health management, and to be so small that they will not affect the appearance and function of the wearable carrier in which they are embedded. One of major challenges is to develop new principle of physiologic measurements in incorporation with effective biosignal processing and medical data fusion techniques enabling the design of small and smart wearable devices. With the support of the Innovation and Technology Fund, we are developing a series of wearable intelligent sensors and systems with a body area network (BAN) forming the communication infrastructure for telemedicine and m-healthcare. This talk will review some of the more recent developments in these areas, highlight some of the evolving concepts of m-health, and discuss how the emerging wearable technologies can meet the growing demand for future homecare and mobile health services. This talk will focus on the development of wearable cuffless blood pressure measuring devices with their potential applications in m-health and homecare.

 

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