Mass Customization of Medical Devices for Quality of Life

• Author(s) / Creator(s)

  • McKertcher, Adam

• Healthcare is an inherently risky sector for innovation. In particular,
  breakthrough innovations pose an even greater risk for investment
  and potential consequences for the end user. These factors make
  the healthcare sector inherently risk averse, resulting in medical
  devices that become outdated.
  This research highlights the maker movement as an opportunity
  to reevaluate how medical devices are perceived, and presents
  Quality of Life as a factor to focus on in order to encourage
  breakthrough innovation. By employing tools of the maker
  movement, and designing a new business model using a lean
  approach, this research assess new technologies as a way of
  empowering medical device users to take ownership of their
  devices.
  The final design project for this thesis involves a custom sit-ski,
  which would disrupt the traditional methods for building and
  distributing custom sit-skis and athletic wheelchairs.

• Date created

  2016-01-11

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Business Model Canvas
  • Lean Startup
  • Ergonomics
  • The Maker Movement
  • Emotional Durability
  • Mass Customization
  • 3D Printing
  • Industrial Design
  • Strategic Design
  • Rapid Prototyping

• Type of Item

  Research Material

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R37S7HT7Z

• License

  Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International