Since the beginning of the fall semester, a group of four seniors has been developing a new and improved version of a medical device for their senior project. The team, officially titled Automated Traction Equipment and Management (ATEAM), has been brainstorming, designing and constructing for the past several months.
According to senior Todd Doran, a biomedical engineering major and member of the group, the product of their efforts is a machine that aids nurses and doctors in preparing broken legs for surgery.
“With a mid-femur fracture, the bones will typically be overlapping,” Doran said. “This traction device is pulling the leg so it will realign the bones and reduce any more risk of harm to the patients leg.”
Doran and his classmates came up with the idea when they consulted with White County Medical Center. According to Doran, the hospital had some issues with the current version of the device. The model in use involves the operation of a manual crank, which requires a strength that some nurses at the hospital could not provide.
Furthermore, the sling that splinted the broken leg was not always reliable. Doran cited instances where a patient’s leg would slip out of the straps, causing the already damaged bone to clash against itself and threaten further harm to the leg. Doran says that their model of the traction device addresses both of these issues.
“We looked at it and saw which ways we could improve it,” Doran said.
The group established that the strain of the manual crank could be replaced by the “steady, controlled pulling” of a motor.
“We looked at the straps and said ‘What’s missing from this?’ and it’s reinforcement of the foot, straps that really work to hold the foot and leg in place,” Doran said.
However, the ATEAM’s innovative efforts will not be continued past the group’s graduation.
“It’s tough to get in the market with medical devices,” Doran said, citing multiple sources of red tape surrounding the proposal including FDA requirements, insurance needs and intellectual property rights.
For now, the device will remain the property of Harding University. As the project nears its closing stages, Doran says that the efforts were in no way obsolete, regardless of the termination of their progress.
“I love what I’ve done with this project and just improving medical devices in general,” Doran said. “I would love to work for a company that either creates completely new medical devices … or even improving current devices.”
With graduation just around the corner and fresh experience under their belts, Doran said he hopes the rest of ATEAM’s role in the biomedical engineering world is just beginning.
