Asked to describe a new degree program at the Medical University of South Carolina, Professor and Hansjörg Wyss Endowed Chair for Regenerative Medicine Jeremy Gilbert started with the basics. “The Clemson Bioengineering Master of Engineering program (BIOE M.Eng) in Charleston is located on the MUSC campus as part of the Clemson-MUSC Program. This program integrates efforts between Clemson bioengineering faculty and clinical and basic life scientists at MUSC to research problems at the interface among engineering, clinical practice and basic life sciences. The new Clemson M.Eng program in BIOE at MUSC will be a complementary element of the overall interaction and will foster increased collaboration between engineers and clinicians. It will help train engineers in the ways in which technology is utilized in a healthcare setting.”
The degree program, initially available only on the Clemson campus, responds to students who want more than a bachelor’s degree and do not want to spend time on research and the associated reading. The M.Eng curriculum provides clinical immersion, medical device design, networking events, industry experience and internship opportunities, all in a single year. According to Jennifer Hogan, the bioengineering department’s coordinator of professional development, “Students are able to combine a great deal of industry experience with advanced knowledge of the world of medical devices. Students emerge from the program with deep understanding of regulatory project management, particularly as it applies to devices.”
The M.Eng offers only five core courses, and those are hands-on and provide a great deal of interaction with faculty. The remaining 15 hours are chosen by each student. Ms. Hogan said, “Half of the curriculum is chosen by the student. Many decide to take courses in the department, but many also decide to study across the curriculum in other departments. Students may earn an MBA Entrepreneurship Certificate, a Medical Device Reprocessing Certificate or Six Sigma certification.” Students who are not drawn to research may spend a year in advanced work related to design and commercialization without research projects or related courses. BS-MS students may take BS M.Eng courses, and vice versa.
Maria Torres, Graduate Student Services Coordinator, was able to provide observations by M.Eng alumni in the work force. She noted, “Based on student feedback, this one-year program prepares graduates for industry positions and regulatory knowledge. With three available sites (Clemson, Greenville and Charleston), students get the clinical embedded experience and industrial guidance that increase their competitiveness in the market. “The goal of the M.Eng in Biomedical Engineering is to make our graduate students work-ready and highly marketable for a career in the medical device industry. The students are provided with the ultimate hands-on experience, which encompasses the medical device design, development and commercialization process. This is achieved by providing the students with 1) lectures delivered by subject matter experts, 2) tours/site-visits of medical device companies, and 3) assignments and design projects guided by medical device industry mentors and clinicians.”
At the outset of the program, student teams select projects from a list of pre-approved, in-process medical device designs identified as having commercialization potential. The students are provided with pertinent Design History File/design documentation for their chosen projects. These designs serve as a model with which students will apply knowledge gained from lectures, site visits and in-class activities to perform project-associated tasks including human factors analyses, voice of customer meetings, iterative prototyping, verification testing, stability/shelf-life evaluations, preclinical animal study designs and regulatory strategy. Additionally, all design teams must organize and carry out monthly design review gate meetings that are attended by medical device design and development mentors who are employed within the medical device industry. Thus, students hone their communication skills while interacting on a personal level with medical device industry professionals.
According to Dr. Gilbert, “The bioengineer of the future engaged in healthcare technology needs to understand the point of care delivery environment and the central role clinicians play in the use of engineering systems like medical devices and to better appreciate
the impact of technology on outcomes. This M.Eng program provides significant opportunity for bioengineering students to shadow clinicians, learn about how medical devices are utilized and where the opportunities for innovation may lie. “Future employers will benefit from a workforce that is highly educated in the science and engineering of medical devices, drug delivery, tissue engineering and regenerative medicine while also appreciating the impact of engineering on the practice of medicine. Too, this interaction will benefit clinicians as they are required to use more and more technical systems to approach care and the practice of medicine. Innovation in the field of healthcare will increase as greater interactions between engineers and clinicians allows for the development and application of new knowledge.”
