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INDUSTRY FOCUS MEDICAL & PHARMACEUTICAL
From nanotechnology to bioprinting!
From robotics to augmented reality,
T
he medical sciences are continuing to undergo revolutionary change, fuelled – in part – by disruptive technologies.
Gordon Styles, CEO at Star Rapid, looks at the latest medical product technology trends and examines how manufacturers are responding Telemedicine devices – which can be used in
From robotics to augmented reality, from nanotechnology to bioprinting, doctors, technicians, researchers and scientists are creating new solutions for healthcare. To bring these innovations to life, device designers must have access to an agile and responsive manufacturing sector that can convert challenging designs into finished products. But what are some of the medical product
technology trends; and how are manufacturers responding? Let’s take a look.
telemedicine and Virtual reality
Many people around the world still don’t have convenient access to a family physician that they can visit in person. By harnessing the power of the Internet and 4G/5G networks, it is possible to send vital health metrics to healthcare providers remotely, who can then use the information to determine what further treatment may be warranted.
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the home, in schools, or even small village clinics – typically have several embedded sensors for common measurements such as temperature, blood pressure, eye/ear cameras, etc. All of the electronics, as well as the control panel, are contained in a single enclosure – usually a plastic injection moulded cabinet. Individual sensors may be removable or connected to the case with a tether or electric cable, but they too are likely to be made of plastic. While plastic cases, handles, sockets
and panels don’t need to be especially high precision, they need to be affordable, robust, lightweight, and made from non-toxic materials that can be easily sterilised and are resistant to cleaning chemicals. Suppliers for such enclosures, as well as the
sensors, should therefore be experienced with medical product designs and, of course, be certified to the ISO-13485 standard. This means that during the entire manufacturing procedure, all raw materials and semi-finished goods are fabricated in clean and controlled conditions, with full traceability and chain-of-custody
1 DESIGN SOLUTIONS JULY/AUGUST 2022
protocols in place. These procedures are used to ensure that the product does not contain harmful contaminants and that the materials used have been tested and verified for legal compliance. Virtual reality and augmented reality are
even more sophisticated applications, but they also depend on wireless communication networks to send and receive complex data. To use the promise of this technology, wearers need to have plastic goggles with embedded lenses, cameras and sensors, as well as gloves or gauntlets with sensitive haptic response feedback. Manufacturers of such devices therefore
need to be skilled not only with complex mouldings but also multi-material or 2K overmoulding, where several different types of plastic and elastomers are bonded together into a finished piece. They also should be able to make optical-grade clear plastic parts with threaded inserts for easy assembly or repair.
micromolding and mems A specialised application of plastic injection moulding is micromoulding, which uses desktop- sized machines with small moulds to make
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