Biodesign for Health Equity

Virginia Polytechnic Inst And St Univ, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

SUMMARY/ABSTRACT We seek to establish a summer experiential learning (EL) program for undergraduate biomedical engineering (BME) students that focuses on health equity education through Biodesign immersion. The Biodesign process is a systematic approach for the identification of unmet medical needs, the generation of novel technologies to address them, and the development of commercialization plans to bring them into fruition (i.e., identify, invent, and implement). We plan to capture key elements of these three phases through a unique EL framework that combines needs identification with parallel research and development (R&D) activities on distinct projects. The Specific Aims include: (1) rural and urban clinical immersion and needs identification; (2) parallel R&D component to support a later-stage technology; (3) assessment of healthcare advancement metrics and professional development by exploring the growth of the students' Engineering Habits of Mind (EHoM). The proposed program is a strategic partnership between Virginia Tech (VT) and Carilion Clinic, an integrated healthcare system in Southwest Virginia with a variety of rural and urban healthcare environments. The improvement of health outcomes among rural patients is more intractable and provides fertile ground for innovation. In the clinical immersion, teams will apply contextual inquiry methods with mentors in the departments of surgery and nursing to identify design opportunities and develop EHoM in systems thinking and problem finding. Preparation will include training on user-centered research methods, such as task analyses for identifying stakeholder "pain points." The teams will plan and document their design research at the clinical sites to create a database of >25 needs with supporting information related to stakeholders, existing solutions, regulation, reimbursement, market, and the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH). Students will prepare a product development plan on a design opportunity well-suited to improve patient care and promote health equity. They will then recruit and lead a future senior design team to solve the associated challenge. The concurrent R&D component of the program captures a majority of the EHoM through the signature design pedagogy. Teams will be assigned to existing projects R&D projects at Carilion Innovation (Cl}, a specialized technology transfer and invention development group for Carilion's internal providers. Students will carry projects through reduction-to-practice and proof-of-concept testing at the Carilion Clinic Center for Simulation, Research, and Patients Safety (CSRPS). Utilizing assigned projects will give students added exposure to tinkering, verification and validation, fabrication technologies, and manufacturing. Building this knowledge base will feed back into the clinical immersion component as an additional set of lenses for filtering needs. Further, multitasking on needs identification and parallel R&D will prepare students to manage different sets of deliverables and timelines in their future careers. Taken together, this program will offer a deep-dive into best practices associated with identifying medical needs and serve as a career bridge for students planning to enter the medical device industry.