Frugal and biomedical engineering for low-resource settings - Engineering Design - Healthcare Technologies

医疗器械市场正以高于药理学和生物技术相关领域的速度持续增长。在2010-2019年的10年里，欧洲专利局每年授予的医疗技术专利数量翻了一番。目前，全球85%以上的MD市场份额由中高收入国家（美国、欧洲、中国、日本和加拿大）拥有，其中美国和欧洲占70%。这些国家制定了事实上的标准，而这些标准在资源匮乏的环境中不能被视为理所当然。当按照这些标准设计的MDs（即适合高资源设置的MDs）用于LRSs时，其安全性和有效性受到阻碍，因为设备的操作环境得不到保证。因此，患者和使用者的安全可能受到严重损害。除此之外，截至目前，医疗器械行业在可持续性及其对环境和陆地生命的影响方面落后于其他行业（例如汽车）。该项目将以以前建立的框架为基础，用于评估偏远地区医疗地点以及设计适应这些环境的医疗设备。它的目的是进一步研究如何情境化和节俭的工程方法，以及移动健康，电子健康，3D打印和原型循环可以用来克服一些主要挑战。该项目将首先扩展现有的廉价医疗设备概念，例如用于筛查糖尿病神经病变的智能手机应用程序，使其达到更高的准备水平。该项目也有进一步案例研究的空间，可以由候选人提出或与候选人讨论。最后，该项目还将研究如何通过节俭的工程方法使医疗设备部门更具可持续性

The medical device market is continuously growing, at higher rates than the related fields of pharmacological and biotechnologies. In 10 years, 2010-2019, the number of Medtech patents granted each year by the European Patent Office doubled. Currently, over 85% of the world MD market share is owned by upper middle- and high-income countries (US, Europe, China, Japan, and Canada), with the US and Europe accounting for 70%. These countries set de facto standards that cannot be taken for granted in low-resource settings (LRSs). When MDs designed following these standards, i.e., adequate for high-resource settings, are used in LRSs, their safety and effectiveness is hindered, because the operating context of the device is not guaranteed. Therefore, patients and users' safety can be seriously compromised. In addition to this, as of now, the medical device industry is lagging behind others (e.g., automotive) in terms of sustainability and its impact on the environment and life on land.This project will build on previously created frameworks for the assessment of medical locations in LRSs as well as the design of medical devices resilient to these settings. It will aim to further investigate how a contextualised and frugal engineering approach, along with mHealth, eHealth, 3D printing and protocycling can be used to overcome some of the major challenges. The project will start off by expanding already existing frugal medical device concepts, such as a smartphone app for screening for diabetic neuropathies, to bring them to higher readiness levels. The project also has room for further case studies that can be proposed by or discussed with the candidate. Finally, this project will also be looking at how the medical device sector could be made more sustainable also with a frugal engineering approach