Biomedical Engineering Students Win National Design Competition \
The Biomedical Engineering Senior Design Program at the University of Rochester introduces students to a systematic, customer-driven design and problem solving approach resulting in development of prototype medical devices or research instruments.
(PRWEB) August 11, 2005 -- Four biomedical engineering students at the
University of Rochester have won the Rehabilitation Engineering Research
Center's Accessible Medical Instrumentation Competition for their exercise cycle
that can be used by people with a variety of disabilities, including stroke,
Parkinson's, blindness, obesity, and deafness.
The cycle, which features
Braille, audio prompts, visual cues, special seating and adjustments, was
designed in a course at the University that teaches engineering students to
design and develop medical devices. It has proven to be such an ingenious device
that the Brain Injury Unit at St. Mary's Hospital has expressed interest in
obtaining and using the cycle for its patients undergoing physical
therapy.
"We're especially proud of this year's students," says Amy
Lerner, associate professor of biomedical engineering and instructor of the
biomedical design course. "Nineteen teams from 16 universities around the
country designed devices for this competition, and we won first place the first
year we entered."
The designing students are all biomedical engineering
graduates: Amy Chi-Yun Huang of Emeryville, Calif., Megan Damcott of Sherman,
N.Y., Ling Dong of Philadelphia, Pa., and Laura Katzenberger of White Lake, N.Y.
Greg Gdowski, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, served as the
team's faculty supervisor.
The students, calling their team VersaErg
Innovations, began with a regular Schwinn recumbent exercise cycle, first
replacing its seat with one that swivels, allowing someone with very limited
mobility to sit down from a standing position beside the cycle, then easily
swivel into a comfortable seated position. The new seat is larger as well to
accommodate people weighing up to 300 pounds. Next, the cross bar connecting the
seat pedestal to the cycle was removed so that a user could swivel into position
without having to lift either leg. Once seated, the patient moves the cycle, not
the seat, into position. The pedals and display easily glide toward and away
from the patient and lock in place, making it unnecessary for the patient to
move, but also allowing a therapist to move the cycle out of the way should
assistance be needed.
To make sure the cycle was fully usable by people
with vision and hearing difficulties, the students installed a large magnifying
glass that can be slid over any part of the display to enlarge it. They painted
all the edges of the machine with highly contrasting colors, and even enlisted
the help of the National Braille Association in creating Braille stickers to
identify buttons and controls across the entire cycle. Voice-recording circuitry
also recites the name of whatever button or function has been activated for
those visually impaired patients who cannot read Braille.
The Brain
Injury Unit at St. Mary's Hospital was also involved in helping the students
understand what would be necessary to make such a piece of equipment easier for
people with disabilities. The physical therapy staff at St. Mary's encouraged
the students to develop the "walk-through" design, as well as the swiveling
seat, citing people who had suffered a stroke or Parkinson's disease—bringing a
real-world understanding of the needs of physical therapy patients that might
not be obvious to an engineer. The students also received advice from members of
the Rochester Disabilities Cluster at the University of Rochester, a group which
comprises faculty from several departments who focus on educating the community
about disability issues.
"The physical therapists who saw it were very
pleased with the design," says Lerner. "Even recreational therapists from the
clinic took a look at it and all think it would be a terrific help for their
patients."
The students went beyond merely designing the cycle itself,
participating in the University's Forbes Engineering Entrepreneurship
Competition. They developed a business plan for how the cycle could be
commercially developed, which won them third place (another biomedical
engineering team won first place with a device to simulate hearing loss). Since
accessible designs can be difficult to market, the team developed a plan based
on allowing customers to select a range of modifications to fit their needs.
The students developed the cycle as part of the biomedical engineering
program's Senior Design Sequence, which is a course required of all biomedical
engineering undergraduates. The course has garnered national praise, most
notably from the Whitaker Foundation and the Biomedical Engineering Society, for
its distinctive customer-driven approach to design. Projects are chosen and
developed in response to real-world needs and criteria, rather than on simple
course outlines. In addition, the students receive training in entrepreneurship,
U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulation, and the ethical issues of
biomedical design. Students have designed clinical devices, research instruments
and devices to aid those with disabilities, with customers from the University
of Rochester Medical Center and others from the local community.
Each
year, students undertake eight to 10 projects and Lerner is already seeking new
"customers," like the Brain Injury Unit at St. Mary's Hospital, who are
interested in providing challenges to next year's students. Individuals or
companies are welcome to contact Lerner directly at e-mail protected from spam
bots, or check the course Web page, www.courses.rochester.edu/lerner/SRDesign, for more
information.
The competition was open to students in any biomedical
engineering or industrial design program, with a prize of $1,000 to the winner.
It was funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation
Research of the U.S. Department of Education.
Contact:
Jonathan
Sherwood
585-273-4726
e-mail protected from spam bots
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/8/prweb270927.htm