The Department of Biomedical Engineering and Dell Medical School (DMS) have partnered to launch robust new hands-on training experiences in the Clinical Innovation Design (CID) program, which was implemented this fall. Participants in the CID program practice design thinking and are involved in all aspects of medical device development and innovation, from needs assessment and analysis of current solutions to prototyping and business plan development.
L-R: Kayli Kallina, Morgan Gaither, Hayley Meier, and Raghave Upadhyaya.
The four students participating in the pilot year of the program include: Kayli Kallina (DMS student), Morgan Gaither (DMS/biomedical engineering dual degree student), Hayley Meier (graduate student in biomedical engineering), and Raghave Upadhyaya (graduate student in computational science, engineering, and mathematics).
The CID program pairs third-year medical students from the Dell Medical School with master’s students from the Cockrell School of Engineering at UT Austin for nine months. During the first six weeks of the program sub-teams, made up of two students, observe clinical needs across a specific clinic service area. The pilot team is based in the Texas Center for Pediatric and Congenital Heart Disease located at Dell Children’s Medical Center.
The two sub-teams spent approximately 500 hours observing 13 clinical areas where patients with congenital heart disease receive their care. Examples of these areas include cardiac surgery, anesthesia, perfusion, critical care unit, the catheter lab, and fetal cardiology, among others.
The teams made 358 standalone observations, and used a thorough assessment process, including needs acceptance criteria, team interest, stakeholder input and market analyses, to narrow down their selections and ultimately choose two clinical needs.
During the spring semester, the student teams will brainstorm solutions for their selected clinical need, prototype their solution and write a business plan for the medical device they develop.
