Technology is more than ubiquitous in healthcare, creating impact and innovation to address challenges, improve outcomes, and enhance effectiveness. Given the fact that technology brings disruptive change to clinical practices, Dr. Wen-Han Chang, Superintendent of MacKay Memorial Hospital (MMH), indicated that the hospital has unveiled the Biomedical Development Center, which is tasked to foster interdisciplinary collaboration.
The "Intraoral Mouse" Controller Enabling Multitasking
The idea came from a surgeon whose hands are often occupied in the operation room. This intraoral, removable controller is embedded with sensors that transmit signals to wirelessly-connected devices. While in the mouth, it responds to the single touch by the tongue to indicate up and down, left and right, and it functions as Enter command with a ‘double-click’. The device is designed to provide surgeons more control of electronic devices during the surgery, allowing multitasking when there is a need.
The intraoral device provides multitasking options where and as needed (Photo by MMH)
■ Potential areas: Assistive technology for disabled persons to control electronic devices, wheelchairs; sleep detection.
Targeting Sepsis Six Hours Ahead for Timely Intervention
MMH employs artificial intelligence to alert sepsis and catches symptoms six hours earlier. The system is visualised and displayed through a dashboard; it has been in use by the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).
AI-powered sepsis alerting system and dashboard (Photo by MMH)
The AI model has built with ICU data collected from 17,273 adult admissions between 2018 and 2020, using clinical parameters. With a sliding window refreshed every eight hours, the system can predict sepsis risk for the following hour, providing preliminary results that enable physicians to anticipate the probability of a patient developing sepsis six hours in advance.
■ Potential areas: The parameters will be incorporated into systems or devices for the monitoring of patients.
AI-Powered Mammogram Analysis for Risk Classification
Analysing and interpreting mammogram images can take a significant amount of time. The team at Mackay Memorial Hospital has thus pioneered a groundbreaking technology, globally the first of its kind, capable of classifying the risk levels of mammogram images. This AI-powered system automatically analyses and interprets mammograms, subsequently generating results, reducing the workload for radiologists whilst enhancing the efficiency and accuracy of breast screening.
In order to swiftly identify sentinel lymph nodes- where cancer spreads- Mackay Hospital has partnered with Marketech International Corp. (MIC) to have developed an AI-powered sentinel lymph node assessment system for breast cancer. This system entails digitally scanning the patient's cytology slides of the sentinel lymph nodes, instructing AI to identify cellular characteristics, pinpoint abnormal areas, and label their locations, determining whether they are negative or positive (to which breast cancer spreads). The process is so streamlined that assessments and marking of positive lesion can be completed within 3 to 5 minutes.
■ Potential areas: The AI-powered mammogram identification and assessment can be applied to ultrasound and MRI images.
Assessment for Developmental Delay, Exclusive to Asia
In contrast to traditional child development assessment systems that often require hours, MMH has developed the “ONE: Assessment for Developmental Delay in Children”, an automated, digital and intelligent system tailored to the developmental trajectories of Asian children.
The system consists of 14 assessments for ages 0-6, with a total of 491 questions developed according to six development facets, allowing parents to easily assess their child's development in the comfort of their homes or communities. Parents are suggested to seek advice form medical professionals if any developmental issues are found following the assessment.
■ Potential areas: The assessment is anticipated to be gamified, allowing children’s response to games to be recorded for further analysis. It might as well be developed as rehabilitation therapy.
★★★More by MacKay Memorial Hospital
◎Synthetic Short-Chain Peptides (6ds) Eye Drops for Retinal Degenerative Diseases
Retinal degeneration diseases include retinitis pigmentosa (RP), age-related macular degeneration (AMD), diabetic retinopathy, cataracts, acute ultraviolet retinal degeneration, and glaucoma. Amongst them, dry AMD has no treatment being approved yet and still poses challenges to develop therapeutics.
MMH’s eye drops consisting of only 6 amino acids (Photo by MMH）
Mackay Memorial Hospital has thus developed eye drops consisting of just 6 amino acids. In a context where clinical-stage drug development has yet to provide a solution, MMH's eye drops have demonstrated the potential to protect the retina and retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells from oxidative stress while activating various cell-protective signalling mechanisms to counteract oxidative/inflammatory stress. Due to the cost effectiveness of this technology, the hospital is actively seeking collaboration with potential partners.
◎Drug-release Carrier for Malignant Brain Tumours
Glioblastoma (GBM) is an aggressive type of brain tumour. The standard treatment is surgical resection combined with radiotherapy and chemotherapy, but outcomes are far from ideal, with a five-year survival rate of 5%.
MMH, in cooperation with the Wan Lab led by Professor Dehui Wan, a faculty member of the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at National Tsing Hua University, has developed a nano-composite hydrogel as a drug carrier. The purpose of utilizing this hydrogel for sustained chemotherapy drug release is to improve local control after glioblastoma surgery, with the aspiration of prolonging the patient's survival time by delaying tumour recurrence.
B2B Opportunities with MacKay Memorial Hospital
AI in Healthcare
| Products/Solutions | Partnership wanted |
|---|---|
| AI-powered mammogram analysis for risk classification in three minutes | Technology transfer; product development |
| AI-powered marking for sentinel lymph nodes | Technology transfer; product development |
| Targeting sepsis six hours ahead for timely intervention | Clinical validation; product development |
Digital Health
| Products/Solutions | Partnership wanted |
|---|---|
| Asia-exclusive assessment for child developmental delay | Image recording; software development; software implementation |
Innovative R&D
| Products/Solutions | Partnership wanted |
|---|---|
| Intraoral mouse controller enables multitasking | Technology transfer; product development |
| Synthetic short-chain peptides (6ds) eye drops for retinal degenerative diseases | Fundraising; technology transfer |
MacKay Memorial Hospital at Healthcare+ Expo 2023
- Thursday, 30 November to Sunday, 3 December
- Booth No. J302 | 1F, TaiNEX 1