Impact of Classroom Surgical Procedure Demonstration Using Artificial Bone in Orthopedic Implant Design

摘要

As a part of the existing senior design class for biomedical engineering students, we have implemented the introduction of surgical procedures and demonstration in orthopedic medical device design process. It is aimed at senior biomedical engineering students to increase student interest and understanding in orthopedic medical device design. The objectives of this course are to teach students many aspects of medical device design through hands-on projects with multiple lecture topics such as the FDA design control process. The course includes lectures about various topics and requires that each student group present research and design proposals to address a specific engineering/design need, work in labs for hand-on practice, and complete a project to develop a design and/or working prototype to address the need. The class was assessed in compliance with the design control process, documentation, laboratory reports, final design, and analysis. For the specific group who chose orthopedic implant, the students were asked to design the devices without consideration of the surgical procedure. After students had a design completed, the surgical procedure was introduced to the groups, and the student groups investigated if there were needs to revise the design based on the consideration of surgical procedure. At the end of the semester, a special assessment was conducted for these groups only, and results showed that consideration of surgical procedure led to changes in final design and a better understanding of orthopedic medical devices. Student self-assessment was completed during three academic years starting in 2014-2015 and the results are presented in this article. This paper also discusses the changes that were made in response to student feedback.