Participatory design methods for medical device innovation in Uganda
department or school: Applied Science, Faculty of
department or school: Biomedical Engineering, School of
data provider: DSpace
degree campus: UBCV
creator: Gheorghe, Florin
issued: 2018-09-04T15:46:37Z
issued: 2018
related degree: Master of Applied Science - MASc
degree grantor: University of British Columbia
description: Orthopaedic injury is set to become the 3rd leading cause globally of disability and death by 2030. Despite the cost-effectiveness and efficacy of orthopaedic surgery, there is a significant gap in access to care. Of importance to delivering safe, modern, and timely treatment is access to high quality medical devices. This access however is limited by a mismatch between the technology that industry is developing and what is needed in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) contexts. Through field study in a Ugandan hospital setting, this research examined two methods for participatory design of medical devices in LMICs that seek to overcome gaps in understanding between designers and users across different cultural and professional backgrounds, as well as the "Expert User" problem. The use of Cultural Probes and Outcome-Driven Innovation has proven useful to perform detailed needs finding, filtering and prioritization, which are critical early steps of the design process. The results point to a myriad of challenges across domains: technology, systemic, infrastructure, staff, and patients, which all contribute to difficulty in providing timely, safe surgical care. They also give designers insight into which technology areas are the most underserved, and which attributes of technology might warrant special consideration in the design process. From these results, the design of a bone reduction and alignment device was prototyped, with feedback sought from Ugandan surgeons. The many lessons from this research have been applied in the past five years to the development and commercialization of the DrillCover product through Arbutus Medical. It is our hope that industry, engineers, and designers take the lead in addressing the medical device mismatch by leveraging these participatory design methods when embarking on medical device innovation projects for LMIC users, and importantly, include these users in a collaborative design process for a higher likelihood of success.
aggregated CHO: https://circle.library.ubc.ca/rest/handle/2429/67083
note: PARTICIPATORY DESIGN METHODS FOR MEDICAL DEVICE INNOVATION IN UGANDA by FLORIN GHEORGHE B.A.Sc, The University of British Columbia, 2011 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF APPLIED SCIENCE in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (Biomedical Engineering) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) August 2018 © Florin Gheorghe, 2018 ii Committee The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies for acceptance, a thesis/dissertation entitled: Participatory design methods for medical device innovation in Uganda submitted by Florin Gheorghe in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Applied Science in Biomedical Engineering Examining Committee: Dr. Machiel Van der Loos, Mechanical Engineering Supervisor Dr. Antony Hodgson, Mechanical Engineering Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Moura Quayle, Public Policy and Global Affairs Supervisory Committee Member iii Abstract Orthopaedic injury is set to become the 3rd leading cause globally of disability and death by 2030. Despite the cost-effectiveness and efficacy of orthopaedic surgery, there is a significant gap in access to care. Of importance to delivering safe, modern, and timely treatment is access to high quality medical devices. This access however is limited by a mismatch between the technology that industry is developing and what is needed in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) contexts. Through field study in a Ugandan hospital setting, this research examined two methods for participatory design of medical devices in LMICs that seek to overcome gaps in understanding between designers and users across different cultural and professional backgrounds, as well as the “Expert User” problem. The use of Cultural Probes and Outcome-Driven Innovation has proven useful to perform detailed needs finding, filtering and prioritization, which are critical early st…
has type: Thesis/Dissertation
date issued: 2018-11
is shown at: 10.14288/1.0371901
language: eng
degree discipline: Biomedical Engineering
provider: Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
publisher: University of British Columbia
rights: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
rights URI: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
scholar level: Graduate
type: Text
identifier URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/67083