What’s up with Truvent?
Design never stops. At least, reiterating and redesigning never stop for medical devices. It is equally as glorious as it is frustrating. Nothing is always sunshine and rainbows, but you do learn a lot when you realize that it isn’t as simple as first thought to be.
In the case of Truvent, we have seen the beauty and the horrors of prototyping a device that needs to address several issues: leaks, form factor, environment, etc. It is difficult, but not for the exact reasons you may think. We are learning all the ways that fail…what was that quote by Thomas Edison?
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
Yeah, that’s it. Instead of thinking that we take two steps down a random road and then turn back just to try a different path, we are instead slowly reducing the number of possibilities that just won’t work. Let me be blunt – do not use force sensors (of any kind) if you want data with DC accuracy. They simply have too much hysteresis to be a reliable sensor. I suppose we have been stuck on this problem because we have seen previous teams use them, so we went along with it. Now what’s that Robert Frost quote?
“Two roads diverged in a wood and I – I took the one less traveled, and that has made all the difference.”
It’s easy to follow in the shadows of previous teams because you expect them to be right. It’s quite ironic, actually, since my extracurricular classes have been teaching me to think differently in the exact position I am in now. Strategic Thinking forced me to process a situation though all its possibilities and to understand why certain things can and cannot work. While I am not saying that the previous work has been in vain, it has given me better insight into why certain sensors work and for what reasons. Force sensors are great because they can provide information quickly, but now we are reaching a point in the project where accuracy for feedback is important, and thus a shift is necessary to get the right information that we need. Never settle because something was right previously. In fact, be open to change, and though it may be frustrating, I have learned that this pivot is how we can make Truvent a truly successful product in the future.
What’s up with mind oVR matter?
Ah…yes. We came up with a clever name for our virtual reality project (get it now??). Anyways, after a slow start to the project, we have established contact with a physician in Baylor Medical who is interested in collaborating with us. We are now hitting the ground running! With his support, along with the slow but sure purchases of our VR system, we can now begin planning how we will deliver livestream surgical videos to students. I am extremely excited to begin this project, and we are beginning with developing the protocol to get this to work. If I have learned anything from my previous projects, it is that you need to focus on basic concepts first before adding all the fluff. What I mean in this context is that we need to first deliver a video from the 360 camera to a person using a VR headset, neglecting HIPAA codes or other variables that (definitely need our attention of course, but…) can be addressed later on. Baby steps, if you will.
What’s up with Chandler/Wicky/Chun/WOOOO?
Not much. I did travel out to Boston recently to see some old friends, but as the program has taught me, always be networking. So I took the chance to visit some people down at Becton Dickinson in the greater Boston area where they do incredible work with advanced diabetes care. It truly is remarkable to see how I have developed as an engineer in the short time I have been in this program – to understand the processes and to have educated discussions on how to improve certain practices was completely novel to me 9 months ago. However, now I can walk into a medtech site and understand their lingo, their methods, and their goals, all while learning how their processes differ to optimize their efforts. It was an eye-opening experience, especially as I jump into the job hunt in these final months of school.
Just some old friends in a new city
We are traveling to San Francisco for a networking event next week, so stay tuned for other blogs to reflect on that experience!