Back close
Admissions

LeapFrog – Innovating Next – Gen Healthcare Solutions

LeapFrog Talks 2021

Deeply influenced by our Chancellor’s vision on interdisciplinary innovations, Amrita Centre for Wireless Networks and Applications has kick started a unique venture encompassing the disciplines of engineering, medicine and biology.

Block Image

As a first step in this exciting journey, we introduce LeapFrog: Innovating Next-Gen Healthcare Solutions, an Engineering in Medicine Research interaction forum. This synergy involves the doctors of Amrita Hospital, Kochi who present the clinical challenges and wishlist with a large audience of engineers, students, data scientists and machine learning enthusiasts, who are inspired to apply their knowledge to bring out effective solutions.

Block Image

Among the numerous talk sessions held, the opening of LeapFrog was conducted on 10 May 2021 by Dr. Sreelakshmi P and Dr. Tushara M from the Department of Cardiac Anesthesia. They shared the experiences and issues encountered in ICUs and as practitioners at cardiac anesthesia department. They also introduced the processes and procedures conducted for continuous monitoring and treating patients which included providing support for hemodynamic stability of patients, intermittent tracking of Arterial Blood Gas (ABG) parameters, usage of various devices such as ventilators, infusion, pumps etc. From this information the audience present were able to comprehend the technological requirements. The doctors touched upon major contributions expected from engineers such as NIRS sensing, COVID applications, development of early prediction of various diseases, etc. They also provided ideas on developing various devices and software systems that can enhance clinical practice in cardiac anesthesia.

Block Image

The second talk was by Dr. Anand Kumar who presented us with a novel concept called “Akasha : The all pervading space ”. His ideas mainly revolved around the theory of space and how biology is connected to it. He proposed a term called “Biospaciology” and showed us the relation between self space and universal space. Quoting famous ideas of Albert Einstein and Tesla, his talk seemed like a journey through the interactions of vibrations in nature with the human body and mind. Thereafter, he postulated the effect of these spatial interventions in enhancing recovery of patients after stroke and debilitating diseases and he proposed developing devices, sensors and software systems quantifying these relationships.

Block Image

On May 13th, the talk commenced by Dr. Priya Nair explaining the various concepts of Gastroenterology. The role of different endoscopic methods for examination were also discussed. Followed by her talk, Dr. Harshavardhan Rao gave a wonderful session that describes the various challenges and opportunities faced by the clinician in the gastroenterology department. The topics to be explored to find effective solutions were connected to machine learning and image processing. This interested many engineers and students present which could be understood from interesting conversations which took place with the doctors towards the end of the session.

Block Image

The second session of the day’s talk was given by Dr Ravi Shankaran from the department of physical medicine. He beautifully explained the requirements with the help of small videos taken during patient illness and recovery sessions. He also expressed his desire to have wearable sensors for gait analysis and development of skin contact EMG devices for identifying muscle activation.

Block Image

Dr. Jaideep Menon, a well known cardiologist, presented various aspects of clinical practice in cardiology specifically mentioning various devices and applications used in cath labs. He also touched upon the requirements and wishlist which included decision support systems that can help the doctors in early identification of cardiovascular diseases.

Block Image

Dr. Siby Gopinath, a clinical Professor at Amrita advanced Centre for epilepsy and Amrita comprehensive sleep centre presented various clinical challenges that they face during diagnosis of epilepsy in patients. He presented challenges of diagnosing epilepsy from MRI and specifically from non-lesional MRIs. A lot of work has already happened in early detection of epilepsy using physiological and electrochemical parameters measured from the body. The strong research team at Dr. Siby Gopinath’s sleep centre has had great success in this aspect of research.
This series of LeapFrog interactions has resulted in initiation of 5 different projects at Masters and PhD level. The students, who majorly belong to the master’s program in biomedical instrumentation and signal processing, are excited to work with the clinicians in order to solve some of the grand challenges in engineering in medicine.

Admissions Apply Now