The number of bioengineering degree programs in the United States has skyrocketed over the past decade. There are more than 70 ABET accredited undergraduate Biomedical Engineering/Bioengineering programs, and this is expected to exceed 100 within the next few years. Likewise, the range of new devices and technologies in the healthcare field has increased dramatically. While the products and services that Biomedical Engineers design and implement are intended to improve health and well-being, they can also create a range of social and ethical dilemmas, especially for leading-edge technologies. As an example, potential difficulties stem from implantable or wearable sensors that can store and transmit personal health information which emergency care providers could electronically access. Yet, this same information might also be accessed by insurance companies or identity thieves. A device that could save people's lives could also be the gateway to harm them. Additionally, public policy has an effect on the funding for innovation and on the laws that regulate it. Thus, students would benefit from exposure to the process of the public policy debate.
Biomedical Engineering (BME) students today are only a few years away from becoming a part of the process driving the development of new biomedical technologies. It is imperative that this generation of engineers be well-equipped to identify potential social and ethical issues that may arise from their inventions. It is equally important that they learn how public policy impacts their work and how to effectively engage with policy makers and the general public to ensure that conditions for innovation are optimized for the benefit of all. Most BME academic programs include ethics and social impact of medical devices only as integrated components in a selected course or courses, and few programs cover public policy. In 2005, AEMB determined to fill in the gaps by hosting an intensive educational ethics session for students during the Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES) Annual Meeting, a leading national conference. Today, AEMB sponsors three sessions at the BMES Annual Meeting, including ethics, public policy and societal impacts. Funding from this grant will be used to (1) provide matching travel grants to students to attend the conference and these three sessions, and (2) to produce professional video recordings of each session for free use by schools and student groups. Students receiving these grants will participate in all three sessions. After they return home, they will facilitate training sessions at their schools using videos and other materials from these sessions. Other student leaders and faculty that attend these sessions will be asked to host sessions at their campuses, as well. Furthermore, AEMB will contact each US BME program chair to request that they use the session materials. This should promote wide use of the content.
Intellectual Merit This set of sessions is a new model for broadening the knowledge and skills of these important topics and for improving student involvement in their profession. Other societies will hopefully recognize the merits of this approach and use it as a template for exposing undergraduate and graduate students in other disciplines to these same problems. Furthermore, this method of educating students via a combination of presentations and discussions is known to be an effective educational approach. The students and faculty participants will be encouraged to use this approach when they run their own sessions and thus promote the increased use of active learning methods in BME education.
Broader Impacts It is expected that student participants will routinely consider ethics, public policy, and societal impact issues during the process of device and technology design and implementation; this will further improve technologies available to society. As they bring this knowledge to their communities they will also increase awareness in the wider society of the important consequences of both good and poor engineering design and practice. AEMB leadership is encouraging all faculty advisors to bring students from underrepresented groups to the conference and our session by applying for FASEB MARC Mentor/Student travel grants. Also, because many local AEMB student leaders are women, this travel grant program will ensure that women are well-represented. Additionally, the professionally recorded videos of each session and other materials will be available free of charge so that any school or student organization can present their content to students. Potentially, this can reach students in every BME program in the country.
Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE The number of bioengineering degree programs in the United States has skyrocketed over the past decade. Likewise, the range of new devices and technologies in the healthcare field has increased dramatically. While the products and services that biomedical engineers design are intended to improve health and well-being, they can also create a range of social, legal, security and ethical dilemmas, especially for new technologies. Biomedical engineers should be aware of these issues because they are in a position to address them through informed design choices and because of their expertise in terms of making recommendations to policy makers. One example of potential difficulties involves implantable or wearable sensors that can store and transmit personal health information which emergency care providers could electronically access. Yet, this same information might also be accessed by identity thieves. Additionally, devices such as wirelessly-controlled insulin pumps or cardiac defibrillators can be taken over by hackers. Thus, advanced medical devices that could save people’s lives could also be the gateway to harm them. In another example, a brain imaging system used for medical diagnoses and research is being peddled by some entrepreneurs as an improved system for lie detection and they are pushing for its use in our legal system. This potential raises numerous questions technological, ethical and legal questions. Furthermore, public policy has an effect on the funding for research and innovation and on the laws that regulate medical devices. Biomedical Engineering (BME) students today are only a few years away from becoming a part of the process driving the development of new biomedical technologies. It is imperative that this generation of engineers be well-equipped to identify potential technological, legal, social and ethical issues that may arise from their inventions. It is equally important that they learn how public policy impacts their work and how to effectively engage with policy makers and the general public to ensure that conditions for innovation are optimized for the benefit of all. Most BME academic programs include ethics and social impact of medical devices only as integrated components in a selected course or courses, and few programs cover public policy. In 2005, AEMB determined to fill in the gaps by hosting an intensive educational ethics session for students during the Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES) Annual Meeting, a leading national conference. Today, AEMB sponsors two sessions at the BMES Annual Meeting, including ethics, public policy. Over 60 students attended the 2012 Ethics Session on the "Neuroethics of Brain Imaging" presented by author and scholar, Dr. Paul Root Wolpe. Later that day, we had approximately 110 attendees participate in the Public Policy Session on the "The Patent law change to ‘First to File’ and the potential impact to BME." Students also learned how to engage in public policy through their US Congressmen from four panel members. We also co-hosted a special session with BMES on healthcare disparities in the African American community, which was widely attended by BMES members, including about 30 students. All three sessions provided ample time for students to ask questions of panelists. This NSF grant also provided money for (1) 30 matching travel grants for BME students to attend our three sessions and (2) to produce professional video recordings of each session for free use by schools and student groups to spread the impact out across the United States. The final edited videos were placed in a DropBox file for easy access in August 2012. Drafts of companion discussion guides for each video are being edited and will also be available on DropBox before the end of 2013. During the 2013 session, AEMB student members and advisors were asked to facilitate training sessions at their schools using these videos. Furthermore, AEMB will contact each BME program chair to request that they use the session materials. This should promote wide use of the content. Through our sessions and videos, we are cultivating future biomedical engineers who will routinely consider ethics, public policy, and societal impact issues during the process of device and technology design and implementation; this will further improve technologies available to society. As they bring this knowledge to their communities they will also increase awareness in the wider society of the important consequences of both good and poor engineering design and practice. AEMB leadership also encouraged all faculty advisors to bring students from underrepresented groups to the conference and our session by applying for FASEB MARC Mentor/Student travel grants. Also, because many local AEMB student leaders are women, this travel grant program ensured that women were well-represented. Over 45% of our NSF-funded travel grant recipients were women.
