Money isn’t in endless supply so new products can’t necessarily be adopted just because they improve care. New products will need to demonstrate improved care AND cost saving. An improvement in care alone may not be good enough.

Infection control is a massive issue and our arsenal of antibiotics and antimicrobials is diminishing. However, the biggest improvements in infection control haven’t come from sexy technologies but from people-centric improvements in practice.

Usability is becoming more important for regulators and notified bodies. Whilst the clinical staff who work in the ICU are relatively well trained, they are under tremendous pressure and have a huge number of products to interact with. Therefore getting design right can have a huge impact on adoption and outcomes.

I think we need to be mindful not to always reach for the ‘clever technology’ cupboard for our next generation of products. Technologies of many and various kinds will continue to have a huge role to play but we must focus on delivering products which clinicians find easy to use, fit with established workflow, save time or money, improve outcomes, and create a strong affinity between our customers and our products.

However, until now the advances in medical robots has not been as pronounced … but times are changing!

As the healthcare providers push for lower costs and better clinical outcomes than existing techniques, I believe we can expect to see some exciting developments in the next 10 years. The advantages offered by robots include higher diagnostic efficacy, fewer errors, less complications, and reduced hospitalization time and cost.

Few medical robots will look like C-3PO, the Terminator or the Daleks, but some have a passing resemblance to R2-D2 or Wall-E. Here is a brief outlook on some of the medical fields that robots are being used in:

• Surgical Robots – One of the more advanced areas is surgical robotics, in which a robot performs surgery under the control of a surgeon. Systems such as Magellan and Sensei X from Hansen Medical, and da Vinci from Intuitive Surgical all enable minimally invasive surgeries through improved visualisation, dexterity and precision. The use of much smaller incisions often means quicker healing, and lower risks of infection and other complications.

• Maintaining Organs – When donated organs are retrieved, they have previously needed to be packed in ice and rushed to the transplant hospital. Systems like the OrganOx Metra – the normothermic organ perfusion system designed and developed by Team – enable the preservation of organs for much longer time periods, and objective viability assessment prior to transplantation. These systems will help to increase the number and quality of organs for transplant.

• Cognitive Therapy – From Japan, we have Paro, a therapeutic seal robot. Studies have found that interacting with Paro was found to improve the brain function of elderly patients with cognition disorders, and so improve the quality of their lives and decrease the need for long term care.

• Aging Populations – As many nations deal with the challenges associated with aging populations, robots will be of great assistance to the elderly and the healthcare systems. Some will help to remind users to take their medicine, some will help to open doors, and some like RIBA will help lift those who are not able to sit, walk or stand themselves.

• Drug Dispensing – Intravenous drug delivery is the most powerful route to administer drugs but when things go wrong, it has the most devastating consequences. Solutions such as IntelliFill i.v.from Baxa are designed to automate the intravenous drug preparation process, and can fill infusion bags and syringes more quickly than people. They typically use barcode scanning, vision systems, and weight confirmation steps to identify final products and to reduce medication errors, and they reduce staff exposure to highly aggressive therapies.In any medium or large hospital, the pharmacy can expect to fill and dispense over 5,000 prescriptions every day, handling over 700 different medications. This is both time consuming and mundane, and human operators do make mistakes. Robots are ideal for tasks like this, and the ScriptPro 200 and ROBOT-Rx have both been used to great effect – to the extent that as of 2009, the ROBOT-Rx had given out more than 45 million doses without any mistakes.

• Sample Storage – Biobanks of varying sizes have been designed, developed and installed which enable the safe storage of biological samples in sub-zero conditions. The Polar system from TAP Biosystems is a network of robotic armature apparatus and temperature components that stores and retrieves up to 10 million perishable samples, at temperatures of -80°C. By using a robot to do the work of sample retrieval, humans won’t have to suit up and enter the extreme cold environment and work time will be quickened.

Developing medical robots is a complex, expensive and long process, however, the need – whether that is reducing the cost, eliminating mistakes or opening up new opportunities – is there and the technology exists. A solid understanding of the clinical environment is essential if the technology is to be harnessed to meet the user needs, but the possibilities are endless.

“Having facilitated numerous usability trials over the years on all sorts of projects – from the formative and summative evaluations of inhalers and reusable injection pens, to comfort trials of aircraft seats and the emergency evacuation of passengers from trains – I have learnt that no matter how simple or apparently well thought out a product or system may be, some users will always use it in a way in which the designer didn’t expect. Therefore I am a firm advocate of ‘user centred design’ principles whereby users are involved during the design development lifecycle (ideally throughout) as part of an iterative design and evaluation process.

It is only by interacting with users that we can see how they may actually use a product and investigate any errors they may make with the primary goal of identifying and mitigating risk. However, whilst new medical products must of course be fundamentally safe to use, by involving users during the design development lifecycle we can also produce products and systems which are not only safe and effective to use, but which also better match the intended users’ abilities, desires and expectations, thereby creating something that is more pleasurable to use as well.

It is an exciting time to work within the medical device sector with Team. Regulators increasingly demand to see evidence that human factors and user requirements have been integrated into the product development process.”

Jonathan brings to Team nearly 10 years’ experience of working within a human factors consultancy environment. During this time he has worked on a diverse range of projects in the medical, rail, utilities, product and aviation sectors working closely with designers, architects and engineers as part of a multi-disciplinary team to ‘champion’ human factors and user requirements.

Jonathan has a BA (Hons) in Industrial Design and Technology and an MSc in Ergonomics both from Loughborough University. Jonathan is also a Registered Member of the Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors (IEHF).

Standing at the top of the 177 metre tall BT Tower I looked across the skyline at the high rise buildings and monuments that make London such a fantastic city and considered the enormity of what I had just achieved. A sense of pride came over me as I was greeted by my support team and friends who deemed jumping on me an appropriate way to congratulate someone who had just carried 150kg up 34 flights of stairs in under an hour.

It was all too easy to get carried away with the moment. Whilst this was a pretty amazing achievement, a world record and thousands of pounds for charity, I had to figuratively keep my feet on the ground amid the adulation and remember in the grand scheme of things this was merely a training exercise for the main event. In May I’d be taking on the 86 flights of stairs to the observation deck of the empire state building in New York City in an attempt to break a world record I’d arrogantly scoffed at one evening almost a year ago to the day. No amount of training could prepare me for the sinking feeling I had in my stomach that was telling me this wouldn’t even be the halfway point.

“Crikey that was a lot of stairs” wheezed the lady from the Guinness World Records office who had been following me up the BT Tower to make sure nothing untoward was going on.

“How do you think I feel?!” was my muttered response.

www.justgiving.com/Mark-Shepherd

“What I really love about this work is the relationships you develop with people at the end of the day. There may or may not be a need right now, but what really counts is that we get a chance to exchange insight with people and find out what is going on, all over the medical device industry, and all over the world. The communication, the connection, the exploration and creativity make my role very fulfilling. Plus, working at the forefront of technology in such an important sector makes it very exciting.”

Kylene has a background in marketing for manufacturers in the medical and scientific equipment industries. Before joining Team she worked solely for Creative Medical Research as their North American representative, and now represents both CMR and Team, who have had a strong business relationship for years. She has a BA in communications, with a focus on intercultural communication, and also has a rather useless degree in classical studies in Latin. Kylene lives in Seattle, Washington USA, but wishes she worked in a 13th century barn in the idyllic English countryside.

“I relish the challenge of creating new devices which can improve the standard of care for patients in the ICU and make life easier for the busy clinicians. I enjoy the challenge of developing products as technologically ground as Sphere Medical’s Proxima™ device, right through to simple design improvements for disposable devices which can help reduce the risk of infection, save money and save lives.”

Ben has worked in medical devices and diagnostics for 15 years and has a PhD in Clinical Biochemistry. He has been involved in the design and development of devices for many different clinical applications across the ICU and OR. Ben was Business Development Manager at Sphere Medical. He’s spent time working on secondment for the venture capital firm Chord Capital on it’s on its portfolio of biomedical investments and was formally a Director of the vaccine company Immbio. Ben has worked extensively with multinational medical device companies, most notably with several operating companies within Johnson & Johnson in the US. Prior to joining Team he was acting head of the Critical Care and Drug Delivery group at Sagentia.

Cambridge, UK – May 1st, 2012 – At this month’s Respiratory Drug Delivery (RDD) conference in Phoenix, Arizona (13th May – 17th May), Team Consulting will be unveiling three inhaler concept designs based upon its revolutionary Occoris™ technology. Designed primarily for delivering systemic treatments beyond the typically inhaled topical asthma and COPD, such as vaccines, pain relief and insulin, the Occoris™ ‘engine’ is ultra-small, active and achieves very accurate and repeatable delivery of API-only formulations.

At the conference, Team will be showcasing prototypes for a single-use disposable inhaler, a multi-unit dose inhaler and a multi-dose inhaler – demonstrating the technology’s multi-platform credentials, and to illustrate the numerous design possibilities afforded by Occoris™.

The Occoris™ technology was developed by Team after the company identified a number of factors that are likely to shape the respiratory drug delivery market of the future:

Firstly, asthma and COPD inhalers typically use an inert carrier fraction to dilute the small quantities of active pharmaceutical ingredient (API). Inhalers that treat conditions beyond asthma and COPD will need to deliver a wide range of dose sizes which do not require a carrier fraction.

Secondly, inhalers for treating conditions such as diabetes, pain relief or delivering vaccines will require very different design approaches. The simplicity and small size (around the same size as a garden pea) of the Occoris™ engine gives designers incredible flexibility in form factor and materials. For example, one of the concepts on show at RDD will be for mass vaccination and can be produced largely out of recyclable cardboard.

Finally, regulators will demand much tighter dose content uniformity, higher delivery efficiencies and better independency of flow rate from inhalers. Early indications are that inhalers that use the active Occoris™ engine will deliver highly accurate dosage and repeatable performance.

“Delivering drug via the pulmonary route offers so many advantages over needles and tablets. The drug is quickly absorbed by the body, in powder form it doesn’t require cold storage and there is no user anxiety or danger of needle-stick injuries. With our Occoris™ technology we are opening up a wide range of new opportunities beyond the traditional and highly competitive asthma and COPD market, which will help our pharmaceutical clients to establish new revenue streams,” says David Harris, Head of Respiratory Drug Delivery at Team. “We are in the process of optimising the technology, and at this month’s RDD conference we’ll be sharing three novel inhaler concepts with the industry – and I’m looking forward to discussing the range of potential applications for the ground-breaking technology.”

–ENDS—

High-res (300 dpi) images of the three inhaler concepts (click on the image to load it, then right click and ‘save as’):

Above – the multi-dose inhaler concept, based on Team’s Occoris™ technology

Above – the disposable inhaler concept, based on Team’s Occoris™ technology

Above – the multi-unit dose inhaler concept, based on Team’s Occoris™ technology

Above – the full range of inhaler concepts, all based on Team’s Occoris™ technology

Media contacts:

Neil Cooper

Head of Marketing

Team Consulting

Mobile: +44 (0)7581 210 919

neil.cooper@team-consulting.com

David Harris

Head of Respiratory Drug Delivery

Team Consulting

Tel: +44 (0)1799 532767

david.harris@team-consulting.com 

About Team Consulting

Team Consulting is focused on medical device development and has a global reputation for integrity, creativity and excellence. We believe devices should save lives, enhance wellbeing and reduce pain. Formed in 1986 we are a fee-for-service business, helping clients to turn concepts and needs into viable and commercially successful devices.

Attracting people from right across the regenerative medicine spectrum, the one-day conference promises to be a great opportunity to listen to the latest thinking, see the greatest breakthroughs and meet like-minded individuals.

It takes place on September 27th at the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead, UK. For more information on the event visit: http://www.regener8.ac.uk/events/2012/09/27/regener8-annual-conference-2012.html.

We look forward to seeing you there.

“My role at team allows me to make a significant contribution to the healthcare technology sector and thus play a part in meeting patients’ needs, which is a massive motivator for me. Team provides the resources required to find sophisticated technological solutions to a wide range of problems encountered by the human body. With technology advancing rapidly, and the vast and amazing complexity of the human body, I believe I am very privileged to be working in such an interesting sector. The problems are not all simple, and so I am extremely grateful to be part of a team of highly skilled people from different disciplines who can share their experience to find effective solutions.”

Before joining Team in March 2012, Michael gained five years’ experience as a Medical Electronics engineer at Maltron International Ltd, where he was responsible for their range of portable BIA (Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis) devices. During this time he received an MSc in Medical Electronics and Physics at Queen Mary College, University of London. Before working at Maltron, he worked for the MHRA for nine months after graduating in 2005 with a MEng in Electrical and Electronic Engineering with study in France, from the University of Bristol.