Medical Embedded System Applications

Embedded systems used in medical care increasingly help to improve the quality of diagnostic tools available to physicians and treatment available to patients.

Design Update and Optimization

Tier One has assisted in the development and optimization of medical systems including a capsule swallowed by patients measuring digestive system pH and control electronics for post-operative joint cooling used on an outpatient basis. The challenges to improving existing designs for these medical systems were varied, including:

• Reverse engineering an un-rationalized Korean design originally derived from an inaccurate German schematic not updated since the early 1970s
• Precisely replicating the analog RF characteristics of obsolete components using modern electronics within extremely tight power and space constraints
• Designing a PCB less than ½ cm2 while allowing for the use of machine assembly techniques and improving fallout rates by 30% to 40%
• Reducing field power supply failures from 50% to less than 5% with no layout changes, minimal re-work, and extremely low changes to bill-of-material cost

The consistency of diagnostic data and treatment effectiveness for these products is, of course, critically important. The careful risk analysis experience provided by Tier One engineers has proven very valuable for our customers in this sector.

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