Biomedical instrumentation

Biomedical instrumentation is one of the applications of biomedical engineering, as it

is a very wide field and is considered new. Most of the innovations in this field were

in the past 20 years. Instrumentation in general is the use of measurement tools to

.monitor and control the process, whether inside or outside the laboratory

Biomedical instrumentation is considered a tool for collecting and measuring

information to and from the body, and some of them include monitoring and control

devices, as well as for diagnosing diseases and monitoring patients undergoing

.surgeries or patients in intensive care

:We can classify biomedical instrumentation into two main types

Clinical instrumentation used for patient care and diagnosis •

Research instrumentation primarily used in the search for new knowledge about the •

various systems that compose the human organism

:Types of biomedical instrumentation systems

Direct and indirect •

Invasive - non-invasive •

Contact-remote •

sense-actuate •

real-time - static •

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 The role of biomedical instrumentation

Medical instrumentation has a very important and wide role in the medical field, as

they have revolutionized the development of the entire medical field, and have many

:uses such as

Gathering information related to the physiological phenomenon of the human body •

diagnosing different types of diseases •

assessing and monitoring the working status of internal organs •

.treating patients and improving their quality of life •

:The most common use of medical devices is the measurement, so it is either

internal (such as blood pressure) •

on the surface of the body (electrocardiogram) •

emanates from the body (infrared radiation) •

Derived from a tissue sample (such as blood or biopsy) •

So far, vital devices in our daily lives have been equipped in smartphones with

.sensors capable of measuring heart rate and oxygen saturation

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Basic Objectives of Biomedical Instrumentation

The medical device is designed to serve a certain purpose, sometimes it can be more

than one, these purposes are:

1. Information Gathering: Instruments used to gather information about the human

body.

2. Diagnosis: Measurements made to help detect and correct the malfunction of the

system being measured.

3. Evaluation: used to determine the ability of a system to meet its functional

requirements.

4. Monitoring: used to monitor a certain situation for continuous or periodic

information.

5. Control: used to automatically control the operation of a system based on changes

in multiple internal parameters.

classifications of biomedical instruments

medical devices are classified into:

1. Diagnostic instruments as stethoscope, and microscope

2. Therapeutic instruments, such as shortwave diathermy, and ultrasound therapy

3. Supplementary instruments, such as hearing aid, and aid for blind

:Functional classification of instruments

 blood Instruments, such as blood pressure meter, and blood PH meter

 heart instruments, such as ECG, and defibrillator

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 brain instruments, such as EEG, and Tomography

 muscle instruments, such as EMG, and muscle simulator

 kidney instruments, such as dialysis instrument, and lithotripsy

 ear instruments, such as audiometer, and hearing aid

 eye instruments, such as oculomotor, and aid for blind

 lung instruments, such as spirometer

 body instruments, such as thermograph, and radiograph

Biomedical imaging instruments

Medical imaging devices are a type of biomedical instrumentation that are

used to see inside the human body. The imaging modalities are:

 x-ray (radiography), First medical image was taken by an X-ray

 computed tomography (CT)

 nuclear medicine (SPECT, PET)

 ultrasound (US)

 magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)

ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging are the safest modalities because

it doesn’t have ionizing-radiation.

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Biomedical instrumentation safety measurements

When handling medical devices, you have the responsibility of patient safety and it’s

a critical role of the biomedical engineer profession ensuring that these devices are

used safely, over the last few years many medical errors have been recorded some of

which has caused serious harm to either patients or people on the worksite, these

:errors can be classified into two different categories according to reason

Active: errors and violations committed by humans, commonly o

referred to as human errors, such as improper handling, poor staff

training, insufficient experience

Latent: errors that are delayed consequences of technical design or o

organizational issues, such as equipment malfunction

Adverse events happen when latent errors are combined with human

.errors

Consequences of biomedical instruments breakdowns can be unusable

devices, untreated patients, wrong diagnosis and treatment, loss of money

on repairs, all that may lead to more serious issues, the biomedical

engineer job is to minimize the risk of errors happening in the clinical

:environment, this can be done by

Checking the device is SFDA Approved o

before purchasing

Proper installation of the device o

Proper training of staff o

Constant maintenance and repair o

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Checking the weekly report of FSDA for o

any updates on the devices you have

Reporting incidents to SFDA o

Future of biomedical instrumentation

Seeing the progress biomedical engineers have made during the last 100 years, we can

achieve much more in the next 100, in 2009 the U.S. National Academy of

Engineering held a meeting with input from people all over the world to identify the

major technologic challenges of the 21st century and to encourage engineers to come

up with solutions. The list contained three challenges related to biomedical

engineering, they were:

1. To reverse engineer the brain

2. To advance health informatics

3. To engineer better medicines

Some of these challenges are already underway but still a work in progress,

other expected changes in the field are to reduce healthcare and medical

devices costs, improve therapeutic methods, and rehabilitation from injuries.

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