RESEARCH & INNOVATION
FROM CLASS TO CLINIC
Undergrad assignments help guide surgery
BY IOANA PATRINGENARU
IT ’ S NOT EVERY DAY that an undergraduate class influences the way surgeons prepare for operations . But that ’ s exactly what happened with a freshman bioengineering class co-taught by then-PhD student Jason Caffrey ’ 11 , MS ’ 13 ‚ and professor Robert Sah .
As part of the Jacobs School of Engineering course , students used CT scans from UC San Diego Health patients who had undergone surgery to print 3-D models of their bone fractures . By the project ’ s end , Caffrey and Sah wondered if the bone models their students made could be put to use beyond the classroom .
The pair partnered with Dr . Vidyadhar Upasani , a pediatric orthopedic surgeon with UC San Diego and Rady Children ’ s Hospital , to investigate the potential benefits of flipping their process to produce 3-D models that surgeons could then practice on before an operation .
In an initial study , Upasani operated on 10 patients with slipped capital femoral epiphysis , the most common hip disorder found in children ages nine to 16 . For half of the patients , Upasani used a 3-D model to prepare and plan the surgery beforehand . As an additional control group , two other surgeons operated on five patients with the same condition without using models .
The results ? Procedures were 38 to 45 minutes shorter for those modeled beforehand , amounting to a 25 percent shorter surgery time . This reduction translates to at least $ 2,700 in savings per operation , researchers say , and it also reduces the time patients are exposed to radiation from the X-ray fluoroscopy beam that traditionally helps guide the surgeon .
“ Being able to practice on these 3-D models is crucial ,” says Dr . Upasani . “ I ’ ve seen how beneficial 3-D models are ; it ’ s now hard to plan surgeries without them .” Indeed , the results of the study were so positive that Rady Children ’ s orthopedics department has acquired its own 3-D printer .
A broader study looking at many institutions and many conditions is currently underway . And Caffrey , the engineering PhD student who organized the class materials and led the model development , is now working on his medical degree at the UC San Diego School of Medicine .
PRACTICAL APPLICATION Jason Caffrey ’ 11 , MS ’ 13 , helped make the custom 3-D models printed by his engineering students available to physicians for practice before surgery .
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