Training

Objectives

1. Produce new researchers in the accessible medical instrumentation field
2. Increase the capacity of medical instrumentation developers, engineering and design students, and medical facility administrators to meet the needs of people with disabilities as medical patients and healthcare service providers

Implementation Strategy

The RERC-AMI's training initiatives are designed to complement its research and development activities. Training activities addressing the first aim focus on graduate and undergraduate education. Training activities addressing the second aim are at a preliminary stage, and will include special training and continuing education events, and general training through dissemination activities.

Graduate and Undergraduate Education

Training programs for post-secondary education to produce new researchers in the field include research assistantships at both Marquette University and Western University of Health Sciences.

Supported Students

• Sean Campbell (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, May 2003 - January 2005)
• Xin ("Tyre") Feng (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2003 - present)
• Jason Foil (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2003 - July 2004)
• Laura Johnson (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2003 - August 2003)
• Matthew Wimmer (Marquette undergraduate student, biomeedical engineering, June 2003 - May 2004)
• Melissa Lemke (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, July 2003 - November 2005) - completed MS Thesis, now full-time RERC-AMI staff (Director of Operations and Rehabilitation Engineer)
• Matthew Schaning (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, May 2004 - August 2004)
• Lora Mielcarek (Marquette undergraduate student in biomedical engineering, now physical therapy graduate student, June 2004 - present)
• David Brafman (UC Berkeley undergraduate student, mechanical engineering, June 2004 - present)
• Eli Gratz (UWM/UW-Madison undergraduate student, industrial engineering, June 2004 - August 2004)
• Michael Baran (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2004 - present)
• Rochelle Mendonca (UWM graduate student, occupational therapy, September 2004 - present) - completed MS Thesis, now PhD graduate student at UWM
• Danielle Richterkessing (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2004 - present)
• Pawan Shroff (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2004 - November 2005) - completed MS Thesis.
• Elizabeth Omiatek (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, January 2005 - present)
• Randy Will (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2005 - present)
• Megan Conrad (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2005 - present)
• Ashley French (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, November 2005 - present)
• Jason Haines (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, May 2006 - present)
• Erin Promersberger (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, May 2006 - present)
• Peggy Keane (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2006 - present)
• Alex Leung (UC-Berkeley undergraduate student, bioengineering, June 2006 - present)
• Adam Luce (UC-Berkeley undergraduate student, bioengineering, June 2006 - present)
• Chrisopher Zanoni (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, June 2006 - present)
• Nutta-On ("Oil") Promjunyakul (Marquette graduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2006 - present)
• Matthew Zwolski (Marquette undergraduate student, biomedical engineering, September 2006 - present)

Recently Completed MS Degrees

• Melissa Lemke (MS Thesis, Biomedical Engineering, Marquette University, 11/05): “The Evaluation of Three Alternative Methods for Understanding Biomechanical Aspects of Medical Device Accessibility: Mobile Usability Lab Pre- and Post-Activity Questionnaires, Mobile Usability Lab Multimedia Video Task Analysis, and Medical Equipment Device–Accessibility and Universal Design Information Tool” - see also highlights of this project, part of Project D1 with contributions to Project R2 and Project R3.
• Pawan Shroff (MS Thesis, Biomedical Engineering, Marquette University, 11/05): “Algorithm to automatically generate multi-modal interfaces for hand held devices based on user preferences and abilities” - see also MedURC simualtion environment, part of Project D3 and specifically Project D3.2.
• Rochelle Mendonca (MS Thesis, Occupational Therapy, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 12/05): "Assessing the Usability of MED-AUDIT (Medical Equipment Device-Accessibility and Universal Design Information Tool)" - see also Program R3 description and the R3 project page from the R2D2 Center of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

Training Through National Student Design Competition

A byproduct of D2.2 National Student Design Competition is that over 200 students so far have been exposed to the principles of accessible design (roughly 25 through the 2003-2004 academic year competition, and over 80 during each for the 2004-2005 competition and the 2005-2006 competition).

Training Through Technical Reports

In addition to working on the RERC-AMI's various research and development projects, students have worked on two series of technical reports:

• Student product surveys - each of these targets a certain area of medical devices, and these include 6 completed reports, with the typical report consisting of about 60 products, with about 40 entries of information for each product (since product lines change, each report will be periodically updated by subsequent students).
• Reviews of design competition categories - each of these target a specific category from the National Student Design Competion, with two completed from the 2004-2005 competition and three anticipated from the 2005-2006 competition.

Each RERC-AMI technical report includes a faculty coordinator, but the work is done by students. Normally these are the student's secondary summer project, as they are also working on a research or design project.

Training Through Courseware, Web Resources and a New Book

Material on usability and universal and accessible design of medical instrumentation was included within the senior/graduate rehabilitation engineering course at Marquette University (BIEN 167), offered in the Fall of 2003 and 2004 (instructor: Jack Winters). During the Summer 2006 we are expanding and updating this resource. In the interim, the following resource materials that are embedded within various reseach and development projects may be of interest:

• usability analysis applied to medical products (within Project R2-Usability Analysis)
• accessible and universal design principles (within Project D2-Design Products)
• multimodal interface activities (within Project D3-Emerging and Accessible Technologies

A key resource is the upcoming book Medical Instrumentation: Accessibility and Usability Considerations, to be published by CRC Press, and available for pre-ordering (anticipated publication date is August 2006).

Training Events

Each year the RERC-AMI has a booth at the Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America (RESNA) conference, and also participates in other meetings such as the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES), and Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI). As more RERC-AMI studies mature, training events will be implemented for such meetings.

On October 20-21, 2005 the RERC-AMI held our State of the Science Workshop at the FDA's Conference Center in Rockville MD (in the Washington DC area).