Medical System Maintenance and Requirements for Low and Middle Income Countries (LMICs)
Insight from a Engineering World Health (EWH) Board Member (& Distinguished IEEE Lecturer)
Lecture Abstract: Many Low and middle income countries (LMICs) have citizens who subsist on $2/Day. Hospitals in many of these areas are rudimentary equipment, usually donated. Some of this equipment, including the most rudimentary equipment are non-functional due to lack of repair. Some of these devices include Bili-lamps as well as autoclaves. The lack of training as well as unavailability of personnel has created graveyards of medical equipment that may be missing lamps or even fuses. Engineering World Health (EWH.org) has been sending students from Universities to spend time fixing simple equipment and to date have fixed a few million dollars of equipment, over 10 years, in African as well as South and central America. As a board member of EWH Dr. Dhurajaty has observed some unmet needs in these countries and these have to be remedied. This will be the subject of his talk.
There is a lack of elementary simulators to determine whether a medical instrument is functional. For example, it is not necessary to have a sophisticated ECG simulator to determine whether an ECG system is functional. Similarly, a ventilator can be tested for functionality without the use of sophisticated equipment. Many of these rudimentary simulators can be constructed using commonly available components and it is an opportunity for developed countries to design robust kits for assembling in LMICs. Furthermore many LMICs have unreliable power and hence battery power charged by solar/wind is a necessity in these countries.
The advent of smartphones as well as low cost platforms such as Arduinos/Raspberry Pi can be morphed into rudimentary medical devices that can enable Telemedicine. A smartphone, today, is a powerful display and computing platform. Even simple smartphones have capabilities exceeding all the computers in NASA in 1969, when the first moon-landing took place. Part of this talk will touch on morphing smartphones into rudimentary medical devices. Dr. Dhurjaty will also mention work that has been done by several contributors, in this arena.
Appropriate technology for LMICs has to be dealt with care. Patient safety and robustness cannot be compromised. Dr. Dhurjaty will touch on some of the standards that govern these devices that deal with safety and performance.
Date and Time
Location
Hosts
Registration
- Date: 19 Aug 2019
- Time: 06:30 PM to 08:00 PM
- All times are (UTC-04:00) Eastern Time (US & Canada)
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- 88 Commercial Street
- Manchester, New Hampshire
- United States 03101
- Building: University of New Hampshire, Manchester
- Room Number: 502
- Starts 09 August 2019 12:45 PM
- Ends 19 August 2019 12:45 PM
- All times are (UTC-04:00) Eastern Time (US & Canada)
- No Admission Charge
Speakers
Dr. Ram Dhurjaty
Medical System Maintenance and Requirements for Low and Middle Income Countries (LMICs)
Biography:
Dr. Dhurjaty is Chair, IEEE Rochester section and a Distinguished IEEE CESoc. lecturer. He held senior positions in engineering and research, in medical systems, at Eastman Kodak Company, Analogic, and Bose Corporation before embarking on a career of full time consulting. He was educated at IIT Bombay and Yale University and has degrees in Civil Engineering, Fluid mechanics, Electronic Instrumentation, Biomedical Engineering, and Control System Theory. Over his career he has designed medical systems such as Patient Monitors, Defibrillators, CT scanners, Ultrasound Imaging Systems, Fetal Monitoring systems, Digital and Computed Radiography, Telemedicine, Telerehabilitaion and precision analog circuitry for medical systems. Six of his patents, at Kodak, on retrofittable digital radiography, to replace screen film, enabled a game changer in the field and a multi-billion dollar industry, worldwide.
He has 16 issued patents in areas of medical devices and systems. He is passionate about affordable medical systems for Low and Middle Income countries. He works closely with the Engineering World Health organization (EWH) developing medical devices for under-developed countries and is a member of the Board for the EWH organization. Ram is Director developed a hand cranked defibrillator to be marketed, initially, in India. He is an expert in high voltage magnetics and consults in High Voltage transformer and design of X-Ray generators. Ram is a member of the AAMI standards committees on Defibrillators and ECGs. He is the chair of the Rochester, NY section of the IEEE and is a distinguished lecturer in the Consumer and Electronics society of the IEEE He is been a past-chair of the Boston chapter of the IEEE, EMBS, a founding member of the IEEE, SSIT and a past representative to the IEEE, Committee on Man and Radiation (COMAR)
Agenda
6:30PM - Networking
6:45PM - Announcments & Introductions
7:00-8:00PM - Lecture by Dr. Dhurjaty
8:00-8:30PM - Q&A
POST-EVENT - Afterwards some attendees will likely adjourn to the nearby restaurant, The Foundary, for dinner and follow-on discussion. This is pay your own way (not on EMBS ;> ) but all are welcome