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Industry

Industry involvement

Engineering Innovation in Health (EIH) develops technical solutions to pressing challenges in health. We welcome projects from your company that will benefit from a collaborative working team of industry professionals, UW students, and faculty.

Benefits

By participating in EIH, you have the opportunity to:

  • Develop innovative technical solutions that bring value to your company.
  • Vet a solution to a challenging problem, perhaps one that you don’t have the resources to pursue in-house.
  • Generate a deeper understanding of a health challenge, market, current solutions, intellectual property, and regulatory strategy that engages a comprehensive set of stakeholders.
  • Work closely with a diverse group of UW students and faculty from engineering, health sciences, and business.
  • Strengthen your relationship with the UW for recruiting student talent and for engaging in future projects.
  • Leverage world class infrastructure and facilities at UW.
  • Receive a nonexclusive commercial license to any project intellectual property developed by the student team or UW employees.

Involvement

The Engineering Innovation in Health program runs for 9 months. Projects typically start in the fall (October) and run for three quarters (ending in June).

Participating companies pay a sponsorship fee and designate an employee lead to mentor the team. The mentor meets with the team weekly to help them understand the problem in depth and guide the solution pathway.

Intellectual property is governed by existing federal and state laws and is subject to best practices of the University of Washington technology transfer office, CoMotion. A company wholly owns its existing intellectual property. A nonexclusive, commercial license will be granted to any project intellectual property developed by the student team or UW employees. Additional, pre-negotiated options for exclusive licenses have been standardized as part of the Washington Innovation Advantage Program.

The EIH process starts with industry sponsors or clinicians submitting a project idea that focuses on an unmet health challenge and ultimately ends with a working prototype solution, which can take the form of a device, process, or application. Project submissions are due on a rolling basis between May and August each year. We welcome you to reach out to us and discuss your ideas. Please contact EIHealth@uw.edu to learn more.

 

Submit a health challenge

 

Sample projects

For a full list of previous projects, visit the Projects section.

SleepAssist »

Approximately 50% of patients with obstructive sleep apnea have difficulty tolerating the most effective, first-line therapy, continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), and other solutions such as mouthguards and surgery have lower efficacy and higher costs and risks. Patients struggle to adhere to CPAP therapy due to the noise, discomfort of the mask, and lack of portability during travel. A solution to treat obstructive sleep apnea that is lower cost and promotes greater adherence would improve management of obstructive sleep apnea.

CathConnect »

A quarter of all hospitalized patients require a urinary catheter ( 9 million US patients). A urinary catheter is a long flexible tube that drains urine from the bladder and maintains its position by an inflatable balloon. If the catheter tube is snagged or pulled. It is ripped out of the bladder, causing physical trauma. A way to address the risk of urethral trauma for patients with indwelling urinary catheters so that urine can be safely drained from the bladder. CathConnect is a medical device that clamps onto the existing Foley Catheter, at a patient's individualized location & when pulled it will create a quick-release breakaway mechanism.

CathConnect

Cardiac Arrest Monitor »

Cardiac arrest is the leading cause of death among people over 40. The treatment for cardiac arrest is CPR or defibrillation. The trick is to catch cardiac arrest quickly in order to treat the patient immediately, because the mortality rate for cardiac arrest victims increases by 10% for every minute that action is not taken. To monitor for cardiac arrest, EKG machines or SPO2 monitors are used, but these devices exhibit inaccuracies. This new cardiac arrest monitoring device uses ultrasound Doppler technology to monitor the carotid artery, which allows for quick and accurate recognition of cardiac arrest.

Cardiac arrest monitor