Personalized Medical Devices: A Guide To Mass Customization For Medical Applications

The increasing focus of healthcare providers on patient outcomes is making personalized medical devices an attractive option.

Personalized medical devices have the potential to change the practice of orthopedics, reconstructive surgery, prosthetics, orthotics, dentistry, and even veterinary medicine, similar to how personalized cancer treatments revolutionized oncology. Numerous clinical studies have shown that personalized devices can improve patient outcomes while simultaneously reducing the total cost of care.

The basic concepts of personalized devices are not new. However, the convergence of multiple technologies enables innovative companies to develop patient-specific solutions in a scalable and cost-competitive manner.

Advances in Additive Manufacturing (AM), medical imaging, and engineering design software drastically reduce the cost of R&D and production of custom medical devices. At the same time, the rise of telemedicine, AI-based diagnostic tools, and robotic-assisted surgery increases the predictability of patient outcomes and reduces the workload of medical practitioners.