Updated 11:38 a.m., April 19.
It was a morning of possibilities.
At Case Western Reserve University’s Research Showcase Thursday, a biomedical engineer talked with a health care technologist, an electrical and computer engineer, a research dean and a venture capitalist about how interdisciplinary and translational research can create jobs and develop the economy.
With the Rise of AI, What IP Disputes in Healthcare Are Likely to Emerge?
Munck Wilson Mandala Partner Greg Howison shared his perspective on some of the legal ramifications around AI, IP, connected devices and the data they generate, in response to emailed questions.
Students and research associates stood next to oversized posters that told the stories of their research–from networking implantable neurostimulation devices to making blood vessels from natural and man-made materials to the effects of interruptions on the efficiency of emergency physicians. Researchers chatted with each other as poster judges wandered the floor, asking questions and writing on clipboards.
Research center professionals and collaborators manned booths that hugged the walls of Veale Convocation Center. At the Cleveland Functional Electrical Stimulation Center booth, physical therapist Dana Hromyak showed how spinal cord injury patient Ryan Housholder used an implanted neurostimulation device to cough–an innovation that enables him to clear his lungs himself, rather than using a suction device several times a day.
The Cleveland FES Center is a collaboration among the university, MetroHealth Medical Center and Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center.
Andrew Gross, medical simulation manager at the Mt. Sinai Skills and Simulation Center in Cleveland, plied a LAP Mentor surgical simulator (made by Cleveland’s Simbionix USA) to “remove” a diseased gallbladder.
A Personalized Approach to Medication Nonadherence
At the Abarca Forward conference earlier this year, George Van Antwerp, managing director at Deloitte, discussed how social determinants of health and a personalized member experience can improve medication adherence and health outcomes.
Heather Clayton Terry, manager of the Self-Management Advancement through Research and Translation Center, explained how the federally funded FIND Lab is encouraging researchers to include people with disabilities in their research programs. Both programs are housed at the university’s Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing.
And Dennis Harris talked to passersby about the National Youth Sports Program at the university, which has been hosting Cleveland youth at summer camps to educate them about avoiding diabetes.
Brian Smith, a research associate at the university’s Department of Biomedical Engineering, spoke about networking several implanted neurostimulators in the body of a paralyzed patient the way an IT professional might network wireless computers in an office.
Using some off-the-shelf components like power sources and wireless radios, the network could control many devices–stimulators that enable a patient to grasp with his hand, sit straight in his wheelchair and control his bladder.
Smith’s group built the system last year, is testing it in animals this year and hopes to test it in a single-patient feasibility study early next year. If all goes well, Smith hopes a company eventually commercializes the network. “I’m not in this for somebody to buy this technology and shelve it,” he said. “I’m in this so somebody uses it.”
Mary Buckett, a Cleveland FES Center researcher who coordinates media there, said such device networks promise to restore independence to paralyzed patients. A patient might say, “If you give me one hand, I can brush my teeth,” Buckett said. “But if you give me two hands, I can put the toothpaste on my brush.”
