Problem Discovery and Selection

Motivation

• Interviews: 
  • Dr. Aaron Colman, orthopedic surgeon
    • During hip replacement surgeries, the femoral head must detach from the ball and socket joint (the socket being the acetabulum).  However, there is a ligament connecting the femoral head to the acetabulum called the ligamentum teres that must be severed to remove the femoral head from the joint, but it is very tough and difficult to cut
    • Given the tight confines of the joint space, the angle at which the surgeon has to cut the ligament is awkward.  Thus, a surgical tool with improved configuration and mobility may be able to solve this problem  
  • Dr. David Karas, pediatric ENT surgeon
    • ENT surgeries are very precise in nature, working in very small spaces  
    • There are especially difficulties in leverage and visualization of incisions.  These difficulties could pose both surgical effectiveness and safety issues, especially in head or neck tumor operations  
• Literature:
  • Laparoscopic surgeries greatly benefit patients (by avoiding large incisions and minimizing recovery time, as well as decreasing the risk of infection), but they introduce new difficulties for surgeons since they are not looking directly at their hands when performing operations, but instead at a two-dimensional video monitor.  Thus, there is a need for more easily maneuverable tools for laparoscopic surgeries (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3741957/#sec3title).  
  • Certain tools involved in laparoscopic surgery can cause internal injuries. Dissectors can play a role in the occurrence of  solid organ and bile duct injuries, and retractors can cause solid organ injuries (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11441992/).  A solution could be developing tools that reduce the risk of these injuries through more biocompatible mechanical design.  

Designs of certain surgical tools are biased towards male users, given that they require more physical force to operate or are compatible with only larger hand sizes (https://eds.s.ebscohost.com/eds/detail/detail?vid=0&sid=b0197441-e0be-4dc4-b237-882e43e6019b%40redis&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU%3d#AN=158968677&db=bsx).  Thus, designing a tool with female users in mind would make sure this tool is compatible with all surgeons.

Broader Impacts

Health: As a surgical tool, our product will have a large impact on the health industry and the health of those that are part of it. This includes the health of the patients and of the surgeons. Those that are performing minimally invasive surgeries have been polled to gather information about their surgeries. The main takeaway was that the laparoscopic tools are uncomfortable to hold for long periods of time [1]. By designing a more comfortable instrument, surgeons will be overall more willing to perform these surgeries. In addition, the patients who require surgeries may be more likely to receive a minimally invasive surgery if the surgeon is more willing to perform them. With this, they will have less risk of complications during surgery. 

Safety: With the current surgical technology used in hospitals all around the world, there are many parts of the body that are extremely difficult to properly access. Even with the most innovative and minimally invasive tools on the market, there is still a risk for the wrong organs to be cut while operating on a patient, which could cause severe complications. Overall improvements of the mobility, functionality, and comfortability of these tools can help to ensure that patients get safer surgeries with less of a risk for complications. 

Welfare: Better surgical tools allow for patients to directly live more comfortable lives as the surgeons operating on them are less likely to make mistakes and/or are required to make less invasive procedures.Therefore, these tools being improved can possibly indirectly make patients recover times shorter and even increase the survival rate of certain riskier procedures. 

Global:  Globally, a more accessible tool can lead to better healthcare everywhere. While many hospitals have at least one of each specific tool, but not everywhere has the funds or connections to do so. Creating a tool that helps with specific needs and can be made readily available is important when considering how our product can have a global impact. 

Cultural: A more comfortable and convenient work environment for surgeons encourages better patient – doctor relations by reducing time stresses on both parties and decreasing frustrations for the operator. This is crucial for doctors who are on call or serving long work hours, and patients who need to travel long distances for care or are time limited by a busy workday. A reduction of pressures and stresses on patients also aids in the mental aspect of recovery, and reduces apprehensions patients might have about having an operation.

Social: More likely to get a surgery if there is less risk of complications. Surgeons will be more willing to perform minimally invasive surgery if they are more comfortable and can navigate their tools easier. Will take into consideration all different types of people when designing the tool to ensure that it will have a positive impact regardless of who it is being used on. 

Environmental:  Since our work is mostly about human beings, there is not a direct impact on the environment that excludes humans from the living organisms. Our goal however, is to overall reduce the amount of different tools needed and therefore needed to clean. In addition to a reduction of surgical time, this would also reduce the amount of resources needed.

Economic: Faster turn around in surgeries can lead to more surgeries being able to be performed. By effectively improving a medical instrument, a surgeon can spend less time on a surgery. By also making an advanced tool that is cheap, it is able to be distributed globally and will be more accessible. 

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3741957/

Market Selection Process

We began the market selection process by individually brainstorming markets of interest and then collectively using ranked-choice voting to narrow our field down to four top contenders: athletes, physical therapists, EMTs, and surgeons.

Over the following two weeks we conducted interviews with experts in the aforementioned market groups, and conducted further research on the problem areas they identified. We used association charts to determine the problem spaces we were most interested and able to engage in within each field, and finally used a ranked-choice voting system to decide as a group between improving the accuracy of biosensors for injury prevention in athletes and developing more versatile surgical tools.