We’ve all seen or heard commercials from the American Stroke Association (ASA) encouraging people who suspect they might be having a stroke to call 9-1-1 right away, because “time lost is brain lost.”. Stroke is the No. 5 cause of death in the United States, killing nearly 130,000 people a year. That’s one in every 20 deaths, according to the ASA. But even if you survive a stroke, you are not even close to being out of the woods.
To all of you who take health and fitness seriously, I say “hang in there.” It’s almost February and you will have your gyms, swimming pools, and fitness centers back very soon. The January influx of people who made losing weight or getting into shape one of their New Year resolutions will soon recede. Lines will diminish for exercise machines and swimming lanes as the lazy side of human nature lures these well-intentioned newbies back to their comfy couches.
Before you can treat a disease, you need to know it exists in a patient. Across the developing world, diagnosis is a major challenge, with hundreds of millions of patients being missed by the healthcare systems due to poor access, high costs, or lack of skilled staff. This article looks at four companies from India that have approached this problem from radically different angles — with impressive results.
A talk with Steven Morris, founding partner, CEO, president, and board member of BIOLIFE4D. His company is leveraging advances in life sciences and tissue engineering to 3D bioprint a viable human heart suitable for transplant.
Before he was an “Outdoor Man” marketing sporting goods in the Rocky Mountains as the Last Man Standing, Tim (“The Tool Man”) Taylor did most of his work indoors — on a little show called Home Improvement. Fortunately for the often accident-prone know-it-all, he had a competent sidekick in the mild-mannered Al Borland, who often knew a better way to get things done properly.
When incorporating human factors into medical device development, conducting user testing and gathering feedback from the device’s target end users is critical. To do this properly, the end user groups must be appropriately defined.
When designing a medical device, nothing beats direct observation of, and feedback from, the people who will be using it. Ideally, this research is performed as a close partnership between the human factors (HF) researchers and the engineers who will be working on the device.
In the past 18 months, the FDA and DHS have been warning the medical device industry about the danger of cybersecurity vulnerabilities in networked medical devices. But the number of medical device cybersecurity alerts has more than tripled in the last three months. Is this an anomaly or the new normal?
The human body is miraculous in its ability to heal. We cut ourselves shaving and the wound quickly scabs over, healing completely in a couple weeks. We break a bone in our arm or leg and the ends of the broken bone knit themselves back together, healing in a couple months. But, what happens when we injure our brain?
A minimally-invasive diagnostic that can help clinicians detect, diagnose, and manage cancer patients has long been the dream of many healthcare practitioners. Now, we can dare to dream.
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