The healthcare market is always hungry for innovation, but breakthroughs don't always come from within. Ahead of life sciences support organisation Cels Business for Life awards in November, John Hill looks at innovations that have drawn on skills and technologies from outside the sector.
SOMETIMES innovation isn't necessarily about plucking something out of thin air. Sometimes it's about being smart enough to look at an existing idea from a different angle.
Let me give you an example. A fair while ago, a surgeon came to a North East filtration company with a problem.
The use of lasers and electrocautery equipment was picking up, but medical staff had a problem with smoke. Specifically, the burning of the skin caused by the lasers was creating a smoke plume. If you were removing things such as warts and verrucas, for instance, the bacteria could be in this smoke, and could be hazardous if inhaled.
Washington-based Walker Filtration was inspired to take on this problem, and produced its Laservac range, which is now in use around the world in hospitals and clinics.
Walker Filtration’s marketing co-ordinator Katie Bailey says: “Basically, it’s a filtration system that clears out anything from the air like viruses and bacteria. It’s got a motor inside that acts as a vacuum to draw the air away. There are other competitors out there in the marketplace, but our product is still out there today.”
This isn’t a company that pays its staff exclusively on the bounty of contracts in the medical sector. It’s core business is in designing and creating industrial compressed air filters, vacuum pump filters and dryers for sectors including automotive, chemical, marine, military and oil and gas.
However, this story from more than two decades ago demonstrates the potential for companies with a certain mindset and certain skills to peer into the medical market, without necessarily picking up a PhD in biochemistry first.
That’s why the innovation section of Cels’ Business for Life awards isn’t just restricted to naturally life science and healthcare-focused companies.
The sector support organisation has seen several companies in the market working in partnership with firms who have different skills to the ones usually found in the medical professions.
“It’s a natural evolution”, says Cels business development director Dr Kenny Lang. “To drive costs down in the NHS we’re going to need more sophisticated technology.”
Concepts such as telemedicine have made it necessary for the healthcare sector to seek out slightly different skills when developing for the new world of medicine.
Of course, the healthcare market is also worth more than £200bn worldwide, and the size of the NHS makes it a particularly fruitful area to investigate opportunities.
This isn’t just the case for UK companies. Back in 2005, Newcastle University professor and Orla Protein co-founder Jeremy Lakey was speaking at an annual nano-technology conference in Toyko when a man called Hiromi Yatsuda wandered up to the One North East stand.
Lakey says: “He asked if he could have a word. He worked for a company called Japan Radio, which has been making Surface Acoustic Wave technology for more than 30 years. It’s in every mobile phone and GBS satellite navigation system.
“Various Japanese manufacturers are looking to get added value on products by getting into the healthcare market. Japan Radio turned out to be more than a customer. It turned out to be a partner. I was very fortunate he turned up on the day I gave my talk.”