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Galen Microsurgery System Eliminates Hand Tremor

September 20th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Surgery

Galen Robotics, a company based in Baltimore, Maryland, has been working on incorporating robotics and microsurgery. Microsurgery requires a steady hand and a great deal of patience, something that robots can be pretty good at. By creating an innovative interface between the surgeon's hands and a specially designed robot, Galen's technology can eliminate hand tremor and provide unprecedented precision when operating using microscopes. The technology comes out of the surgical robotics program at Johns Hopkins University and Galen, named after Galen of Pergamon, the famous Roman physician, is the spinoff...

Discreet Wearable for Hair Regrowth Using Body-Generated Electricity

September 20th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

News

While there are some devices and medications out there to help slow hair loss and regrow hair, they're bulky, uncomfortable, or have substantial side effects. Low-frequency electric stimulation, delivered in pulses and over extended time periods, has a great deal of potential as an effective way to promote hair growth. The problem is that it currently requires batteries, electronics, electrodes, and accompanying components to work, making it impractical to implement in a hat. Now, engineers at University of Wisconsin-Madison have developed a device that is small enough to be placed...

Hydrogel Mimics of Heart Tissue to Study Cardiac Reshaping Following Aortic Valve Implantation

September 19th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Cardiac Surgery

Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) procedures have become a popular way of treating aortic valve stenosis, a condition in which the valve stiffens and worsens cardiac function. Following implantation of a prosthetic valve, the hearts of patients tend to undergo significant reconstruction around the treatment site, but the mechanics of this process are poorly understood. It is difficult to study the hearts of living people, so a novel laboratory solution was necessary. Researchers at University of Colorado Boulder and University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus have come up with just...

Minimally Invasive Biopsies Provide Maximum Pathology Data

September 19th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Pathology

Current pathology techniques for analyzing biopsy tissues are lacking in their ability to detect cancer in small samples. Being able to rapidly study the distribution of protein expression within cells, gathered from minuscule samples, could be an important tool for early diagnosis and monitoring of cancer. Now, researchers at National University of Singapore have reported in Nature Biomedical Engineering that they have been able to use programmable DNA barcodes to measure and localize billions of protein markers within just a couple of hours. Called STAMP (Sequence-Topology Assembly for Multiplexed Profiling),...

Machine Learning Helps Predict Risk of Heart Failure in Patients with Diabetes

September 19th, 2019 by Siavash Parkhideh

Cardiology

Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and UT Southwestern Medical center have developed a new machine learning algorithm that predicts the risk of heart failure hospitalization for people suffering from type 2 diabetes. Their work demonstrates that among 147 different demographic, clinical, and biological data, there is an important top 10 list of predictors, which includes BMI, age, hypertentsion, creatinine, HDL-C, and QRS duration. One day, insightful algorithms such as these will hopefully be integrated into electronic health record systems, allowing physicians to identify risk factors for individual patients and...

Early Bird, an Internal Bleeding Detector, Now Available In U.S.

September 18th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Vascular Surgery

Saranas, a Houston, Texas firm, is releasing its novel Early Bird bleeding monitoring system in the United States, following FDA de novo approval of the device. Intended for use during minimally invasive vascular procedures, the Early Bird helps to identify dangerous events such as ruptured or dissected vessels. Such incidents can result from using large tools, such as those used during transcatheter aortic valve replacements, and they are often undetected for too long, leading to extensive internal bleeding or blood extravasation. Currently the only device with this kind of capability,...

Smith & Nephew Releases PICO 7Y Negative Pressure Wound Therapy in U.S.

September 18th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Surgery

In the United States, Smith & Nephew is releasing its PICO 7Y negative pressure therapy system that can treat two wounds at the same time. The device uses a single pump to support two dressings thanks to a special Y extension. The capability helps to reduce costs and makes it easier on patients. Women undergoing a double mastectomy, for example, will certainly benefit from not having to wear two separate devices during recovery. The PICO 7Y uses Smith & Nephew's AIRLOCK technology that helps to ensure that the negative pressure...

Measuring Pain Levels Using Functional Near Infrared Spectroscopy

September 18th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Pain Management

Knowing how much pain a patient is in can help clinicians to diagnose a condition, understand the course of a disease, and set a course for treatment. While simply hearing patients out works pretty well for the general population, unconscious and non-communicative people are not properly assessed all too often. Now, researchers from MIT, Harvard, and nearby hospitals have come up with what they believe is an objective method of measuring the pain that individuals experience using a non-invasive imaging technique. They're using functional near infrared spectroscopy to peer into...

Bacterial Swarmbots to Produce Biologic Drugs

September 17th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Medicine

Biologics, being a group of drugs synthesized from biological sources, are often produced using bacteria. The manufacturing processes are usually slow and laborious, though they do benefit from economies of scale. Producing small quantities of biologics is typically limited to research labs, and even there it is limited in scope. Researchers at Duke University have now come up with an entirely new way to manufacture biologic drugs using engineered bacteria and tiny capsules. The bacteria, which the researchers have dubbed "swarmbots," are programmed to know when their density inside the...

Material to Repair Cardiac Tissue Damaged by Heart Attacks Passes First Clinical Trial

September 17th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Cardiac Surgery

Ventrix, a spin-off company of the University of California San Diego, has developed a special hydrogel that can be injected into the heart to provide a platform for cardiac repair following a heart attack. The technology was just tested in humans for the first time as part of an FDA-approved Phase 1 clinical trial. Though limited in size, the study pointed to the safety of the hydrogel and there are definite signs that it helps to improve cardiac function. The hydrogel is produced from the extracellular matrix of pig hearts...

FDA Clears Siemens Artis icono Angiography Systems

September 17th, 2019 by Medgadget Editors

Neurology

Siemens Healthineers won FDA clearance for the ARTIS icono angiography systems that are designed for use in a variety of procedure types. The ARTIS icono 2D/3D biplane system is intended for neuroradiology and abdominal imaging while the ARTIS icono floor has a single fluoroscope and is designed for vascular, interventional cardiology, surgical, and oncology procedures. Siemens touts its "OPTIQ image chain" implemented in the ARTIS icono, which supposedly "redesigns image processing for 2D imaging". The technology works to optimize images taken from different angles and in patients big and small....

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