Chief Technology Officer
SimQuest
Boston, MA
Abstract: Flight simulation has been successfully used to train commerical and military pilots for more than 30 years. It is essential since: 1) training in the real aircraft is dangerous for passengers, the public, the pilot, and the aircraft, 2) rapid cognitive assessment and proprioceptive action is required, 3) training for emergencies is difficult, and 4) the aircraft is expensive to operate. Surgery training, especially in minimally invasive procedures, has similar difficulties and simulation-based training has now worked its way through research and development into productization. Differences in the business environments and technical challenges between the two types of simulation have slowed the emergence of surgical trainers, but they have now begun to show value. Advances in cost effective computation technology as well as mathematical modeling and numerical techniques are allowing such trainers to be financially feasible. Not all surgical training requires a simulation trainer, just as not all aspects of flight instruction use simulation. Careful evaluation of surgical procedures and subtasks within those procedures is needed to select those aspects which will benefit. Such criteria, while objective to some degree, still embody a great deal of subjectivity. Once activities have been chosen, techniques learned from the evolution of flight trainers have been applied to the human factors and training elements to define what is essential to the learning experience. This information is combined with multi-disciplinary engineering and software development practices to create commercial quality simulation-based surgical trainers. An growing number of procedures are now becoming available on simulation-based training and the FDA has recently implicitly mandated the use of simulation-based trainers for physician certification in carotid stent placement.
Bio: Dr. Dwight Meglan has been applying simulation-centered technologies to medicine for almost 20 years. Currently he is involved in developing several simulators for training in open surgery, combat casualty care, and dental restoration. Prior to this, he worked with two startup companies developing surgical robots to enable dexterous intervention with flexible endoscopes in the heart and the GI system while also assisting surgical simulation projects.
For the previous 7 years, he worked exclusively on using mathematical modeling to create real-time simulations for minimally invasive procedures. This began as a focus on training and broadened into clinical products that use simulation to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of procedures. Through this period, he guided a number of surgical simulation projects at several startup companies, with a number of these simulators now commercially available. During that time, he was also with Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs where he built an intrapreneurial group focused on computation in the operating room products. In addition to guiding the technical aspects of surgical simulation, he has been active in developing several business models.
Before working on the surgical simulation products, Dr. Meglan worked in a Stanford/MIT team that developed an augmented reality knee arthroscopy system in the early 1990s. His post doctoral work at the Mayo Clinic Orthopedic Biomechanics laboratory focused on locomotion simulation and analysis techniques as well as modeling of the human knee to better define surgical procedures and rehabilitation protocols. The coupled dynamics concept in his doctoral work continues to be a controversial area of research in the human locomotion research community.
Dr. Meglan has a number of on going interests that combine computation, motion measurement, and electromechanical systems to facilitate a more fulfilled life for those with physical needs including his own brain injured daughter.
Related Information: Simquest Gallery - Beautiful Animations illustrating Simquest projects: http://www.simquest.com/gallery2.htm