HealthTEC Innovation Design - a proposal for a novel Master degree program based on Unmet Clinical Need, global Healthcare Challenges, and 21st century skills

• Published in: Current directions in biomedical engineering Vol. 6; no. 3; pp. 599 - 603
• Main Author: Friebe, Michael
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: De Gruyter 01.09.2020
• Subjects: 21st century skills; Biodesign; Biomedical Entrepreneurship; Biomedicalengineering Education; Exponential Technologies; Health 4.0; Health Democratization; Healthcare Ethics; Healthcare Innovation; Healthtec Innovation Management; Prevention; Reverse Innovation
• ISSN: 2364-5504; 2364-5504
• DOI: 10.1515/cdbme-2020-3153

The effectiveness, efficiency, availability, agility, and equality of global healthcare systems are in question. The COVID-19 pandemic have further highlighted some of these issues and also shown that healthcare provision is in many parts of the world paternalistic, nimble, and often governed too extensively by revenue and profit motivations. The 4th industrial revolution - the machine learning age - with data gathering, analysis, optimisation, and delivery changes has not yet reached Healthcare / Health provision. We are still treating patients when they are sick rather then to use advanced sensors, data analytics, machine learning, genetic information, and other exponential technologies to prevent people from becoming patients or to help and support a clinicians decision. We are trying to optimise and improve traditional medicine (incremental innovation) rather than to use technologies to find new medical and clinical approaches (disruptive innovation). Education of future stakeholders from the clinical and from the technology side has not been updated to Health 4.0 demands and the needed 21st century skills. This paper presents a novel proposal for a university and innovation lab based interdisciplinary Master education of HealthTEC innovation designers.