Perth Biodesign 2023
Training the Next Generation of Biomedical Entrepreneurs
Administered by
Partners
2023 Course Directors
Chloe Goodred
Course Director
Chloe is an innovative and effective healthcare leader who is passionate about improving the way we design and deliver care to improve outcomes for patients, staff and the broader community. Chloe began her career as a physiotherapist and worked across a range of clinical settings before pivoting into clinical service design and project management. Her curiosity and passions for problem solving, diverse collaborations and systems thinking led her into the innovation and entrepreneurship space, co-founding a digital health startup and acting as a boundary spanner to bring public and private sector innovators together. Most recently Chloe led the Kaartdijin Innovation Centre at South Metropolitan Health Service, including establishment in 2019 – the first innovation hub for WA public health services. She has engaged, connected and empowered clinicians, technicians, corporate staff and external partners to dream big and innovate to solve problems. Chloe also has a keen interest in Aboriginal health, wellbeing and justice including volunteer work for Enterprise Partnerships WA, a not-for-profit partnering with remote First Nations communities to facilitate entrepreneurship and activate community-led enterprises that foster health and well-being. In particular, Chloe is working with Oliver Bazzani to deliver the Perth Biodesign course and with Sandra Medic to deliver the Biodesign content for iPREP Biodesign.
Oliver Bazzani
Course Director
Oliver is a founder, investor, and educator, with over seven years’ experience working across technology, investment, strategy, and growth. He has worn multiple hats, including Director, Growth Lead, Facilitator, Mentor, and Product Manager. As a result, he has been lucky to learn from and collaborate with hundreds of innovators, founders, corporate leaders, and investors from across Australia, Canada, and the US. Driven by his passion for tackling big problems, Oliver has worked throughout the innovation ecosystem, including developing programs for the first Indigenous Angel investors, early-stage Founders, and Health System Innovators; to building a co-working and performance space for Regional Creatives. His interest in healthcare was sparked during his participation in Perth Biodesign for Digital Health 2020, where he and his team sought to solve the problem of finding the psychologist that's right for you. Their solution, Charli, was recognised as the winner of the 2020 Perth Biodesign program and 2020 Freo Startup Fest. Currently, in addition to being Program Delivery Lead for the Perth Biodesign Course, Oliver is Program Designer, Facilitator and Mentor for the Australian Clinical Entrepreneur Program. He also invests and connects Founders to their first cheques with the Perth Angels Investor Group, Startmate and AirTree. He also empowers artists across Western Australia as Chairperson of Regional Arts WA.
2023 Cohort
Chat
Chandrasekera
Medical Intern
Digital Health
Justin
Chong
Project Development Manager
Software Development, Medical Devices, Control Algorithms, Cryptocurrency
Sarah
Daly
Research Scientist
Diagnostics, Cancer, Medical Devices
Dr Francesco
De Toni
Healthcare Innovation Projects
Adjunct Research Fellow
PhD Linguistics, Natural Language Processing, Artificial Intelligence
Rhys
Jones
PhD Student
Electrical Engineering /Optics
Jeffrey
Low
Associate Clinical Specialist
Product Design,
Cardiac Electrophysiology, Medical Devices
Nivruthi
Shekar
Postgraduate Researcher
Biomedical Science, Nanotechnology
Paul
Stone
Software Engineer, Technology Consultant
Software Development, Cloud Devops + Security
Mais
Zaher
Biomedical Engineer
Technical, Clinical,
Medical Devices,
Equipment Lifecycle Management,
Asset Management
Michael
De Luca
Audiologist
Paediatric Audiology, Remote Audiology
Rhiannon
Foster
Management
Consultant
Business, Human Centred Design, Change Management, Transformation
Dr Peter
King
Facility Manager
Facility management, R&D leadership, Analytical Software commercialisation, PhD Biochemistry
Jean
Mangharam
Consultant Ergonomist, Physiotherapist
Human Factors, Prevention, Musculoskeletal, Falls, Governance, Research
Harpreet
Singh
Clinical Nurse Educator, Registered Nurse
Coronary Care, Angiography
Vithan
Thillairajah
Clinician
Public Health, Rural Medicine, Multicultural & Youth Advocacy
Perth Biodesign Teams
Be Prepped
Need Statement
A way to improve the effectiveness of bowel preparation for people having colonoscopy to improve the patient experience and increase the rate of successful colonoscopy completion.
The Problem
Colorectal cancer is major cause of death globally (9.4%) and the second most common cause of cancer related death in Australia and worldwide. As rates continue to rise, including in adolescents and young adults, early screening and detection is the key to prevention. The gold standard test is colonoscopy. However, many people have to cancel (18.8%) or repeat their colonoscopy due to insufficient completion of the prescribed bowel preparation. Furthermore, physical discomfort and confusion regarding the complexity of bowel preparation causes many people to avoid prescribed colonoscopy, altogether. Research has shown that up to 31% of people suffer adverse reactions such as vomiting and abdominal pain whilst patient surveys and online forums demonstrate the multitude of people confused by the lack of instruction and support for bowel preparation from service providers.
The Solution
Be Prepped is an easy and complete solution for colonoscopy bowel preparation. It transforms the multiple steps and confusing instructions into a simple and convenient process, tailored to the patient’s prescription, support needs and dietary preferences. Be Prepped is the seamless and caring patient journey that specialists want their patients to experience from the initial appointment through to colonoscopy after-care. Home delivered boxes are carefully packed with quality meals that comply with the bowel preparation requirements along with the prescribed bowel preparation and symptom relief pack. A digital application provides the instruction and reminders to assist patients comply with the important steps required for several days before their procedure, including easy to understand educational videos specific to the kit and with translation to common language groups.
Members
Jeffrey Low, Jean Mangharam, Mais Zaher
Medivox
Need Statement
A way to deliver instant and accessible interpretation for patients who do not speak the same language as their doctors in order to enhance patients’ understanding of health information
The Problem
In our globally connected world, healthcare faces a critical challenge: language barriers hindering effective care for culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) patients. This issue is not just about communication; it's about patient safety and quality of care. For CALD patients, limited ability to communicate with clinicians results in poorer health, lower adherence to medications, and less ability to self-manage their health conditions. For clinicians, language barriers are an additional challenge to providing quality of care and are a risk factor in medical errors. For health service providers, this communication gap also leads to more frequent readmissions, and unnecessary tests to compensate for poor verbal information. With migration shaping demographics globally, effectively bridging these language gaps in healthcare has never been more urgent. Current solutions are not working, as they are either difficult to access or not suitable for health care.
The Solution
Medivox presents an innovative solution to bridge language gaps in healthcare. Our AI-powered technology offers real-time, automated interpretation tailored for healthcare settings. Beyond mere translation, Medivox prioritizes clear understanding, featuring a unique verification system to assess translation accuracy and employing the teach-back method for assured comprehension. This technology enhances healthcare access and quality for CALD patients, ensuring effective communication of their needs. It boosts healthcare professionals' confidence, reduces medical errors, and eases stress. For health-care providers, Medivox streamlines operations and reduces costs, fostering a more inclusive and efficient healthcare communication landscape.
Members
Chat Chandrasekera, Justin Chong, Sarah Daly, Dr Francesco De Toni, Paul Stone
Sound-Asleep
Need Statement
A way to improve early diagnosis of hearing loss in children who are not able to complete play audiometry in order to reduce the number of hearing tests required and shorten time to intervention.
The Problem
Hearing loss in infants and children is a significant problem which results in delays in speech and language development. These delays lead to wide ranging learning problems and impact many other aspects of their development, at huge cost both personally and to society. Early diagnosis of hearing loss is critical to allow early intervention, either using hearing devices or medical means, to address the hearing loss, and in turn allow speech and language to develop normally. Unfortunately diagnosing hearing loss in the critical age period (under 3 y.o.a.) is difficult since the patient is seldom cooperative and the testing procedure can require sedation. This, along with the testing environment of the clinic and equipment used makes successful testing erratic and often leads to the need for repeated appointments. This results in multiple journeys to the clinic, wasted clinician time and long waiting lists for test appointments.
The Solution
We are developing a novel diagnostic device for testing infant hearing during natural sleep at home. This device will be worn by the child overnight or during other periods of natural sleep and automatically collect diagnostic data to be analysed. The extended data collection periods will significantly increase accuracy and reliability and the results wirelessly transmitted back to the clinic for review by an audiologist when completed. The benefits of this approach will be fewer failed tests, remove the need for expensive sedated testing, free-up time for the audiologist and reduce waiting lists for patients needing in-clinic attention.
Members
Harpreet Singh, Nivruthi Shekar, Michael De Luca, Dr Peter King, Rhys Jones
Also Presenting at Perth Biodesign Showcase 2023
HaemoTrack
Need Statement
A way to promptly diagnose a severe internal haemorrhage in patients with blunt trauma injuries to reduce time to intervention and lower mortality rates.
The Problem
Internal haemorrhages are medical emergencies which are responsible for a high proportion of preventable deaths. A critical window exists between 30 minutes to 2 hours from arrival which accounts for 84.4% of haemorrhagic patient mortality. Furthermore, for patients that require surgical intervention for an internal haemorrhage, the probability of death increases by 0.35% for every minute spent in the emergency department. Therefore, early intervention and diagnosis are imperative for reducing mortality. Diagnosis is challenging as it currently relies on clinical suspicion, made difficult due to non-specific symptoms that require further imaging to identify. An ultrasound technique (Focused Assessment with Sonography for Trauma) is often the first choice, but still requires an initial experienced clinician’s suspicion before being performed. Blood tests can also be used as an indicator, however results from a whole blood cell count lab analysis could take up to a few hours.
The Solution
To reduce the time to take diagnostic action, a solution is required which eliminates initial clinician uncertainty and delays. The HaemoTrack addresses this by providing automated continuous monitoring of biomarkers in blood. The device will calculate and rapidly output the likelihood for internal haemorrhaging. Clinicians will benefit from the automated, handsfree device which assists in promptly making confident decisions on any further diagnostic tests or intervention that the patient needs. The HaemoTrack will support accelerated internal haemorrhage diagnosis to reduce preventable deaths and revolutionise trauma patient care.
Members
Cara Boyce, Thehara Sesadi Sumanaratha, Putri Sunarko, Laura Tan, William Tran, Cooper Winstanley
RheumaView
Need Statement
A way to quickly and accurately diagnose gout in suspected patients to prevent flares and surgeries associated with late diagnosis.
The Problem
Gout, characterised by hyperuricemia, is the most common form of inflammatory arthritis, starting with acute gout flares caused by Monosodium urate (MSU) crystals built up in the joint fluid. Chronic gout occurs in 10% of patients and leads to tophi development, which are painful subcutaneous crystal deposits that lead to the destruction of the joint and poor patient outcomes including joint dysfunction, bone erosion, deformity, joint stiffness, pain, and joint replacement or reconstruction surgery. Global prevalence varies, with Western countries at 2.6-6.7%, showing an increasing trend. Typical diagnosis accuracy is 85%, but atypical presentations (seen more in women, elderly, and those on certain medications) drop accuracy to 45%. The current diagnostic pathway for gout is inadequate and lengthy, leading to treatment delays and increased likelihood of chronic gout and subsequent painful and costly outcomes.