Flexible electronics in healthcare
Technology of the day though advanced, is bulky and and not portable. It is very cumbersome to carry it from one place to another. This makes the patient’s presence in hospital compulsory. Often the patient has to spend a long time, even days in hospitals to be kept under observation. These practices though important do not synchronize with the busy schedule and the lifestyle.

There are times, when a complex and intricate surgery have to be done to know and diagnose an ailment. The patient has to be diagnosed during seizures. Using electrodes and insertion methods are difficult to employ during these times.

With the help of flexible electronics and nanotechnology, circuits can be designed which can be implanted directly on the brain through a small insertion and the data can be recorded. This is far more less painful and traumatic to the patient and convenient for the physician.

Similarly, body patches containing circuits can be manufactured and pasted on areas of the patient’s skin to record the electrical activities of brain and heart. A patient do not need to suffer pain and inconvenience in a hospital. The data can later be transmitted to the doctor. Similar body patches can be manufactured for monitoring blood pressure, blood sugar and heart beat rate. The body need not be pierced for the purpose. The sensor can be made very small with the help of nanotechnology and can be used for medical and healthcare purposes.

Research is going on to produce lenses that can regulate and warn for glaucoma and body patch circuits that monitor the personal health of a person. Efforts are also being made to produce electronic circuits that will dissolve in the body after the job is done without causing any harm to body. This can reduce the labor and pain of surgery.

Benefits of flexible electronics in health care

• Bulky hardware and sensors are eliminated. The patient can move around and perform their work.
• The patient has to be admitted in hospital for constant observation.
• Less insertions and incisions make it less painful and traumatic for the patients.
• Data can be recorded and transmitted to gadgets such as smart phones and laptops.
• They are flexible in nature and when implanted do not cause pain to patient during body part movement.
• They do not cause any side effect or allergy and are safe for.

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Medical electronics experienced double digit growth in recent years and this growth trajectory is expected to continue due to rise in chronic diseases, increased urbanization and population.

The U.S. National Academy of Engineering held a meeting in 2009 and took inputs from people all over the world to determine technological challenges of the 21st century to encourage engineers to bring with solutions.

The major challenges are: 1) to reduce labor in diagnosis 2) to advance health informatics and 3) to engineer better medicines. The future developments can be expected in fields where the use of robotic technology, telemedicine, body area networks, drug delivery mechanisms and electronic pills is large.

1. Reducing labor in diagnosis
The first challenge is reducing labor in diagnosis. With the advancement in the medical electronic devices, medical care expenses are increasing day by day. If this continuous to be the same in the next coming years it can’t sustain. This is exactly true in case of United states where health care costs are extreme. If the goal is to reduce the costs of health care one should look at the points where the costs are high. Costs are similar to medical and other services, which include raw materials, labor and capital. Advancements in the information technology and automation & robotics dictates the changes that are expected in health care.

To take the advantage of cost savings offered and time zone differences, many medical institutions outsource tasks reading of radio graphs and study of pathology slides. Use of robotic technology can reduce the cost and brings a positive impact on use of labor. Robots can be employed in child care and surgery can be performed by robots that are directed by doctor. This all leads to reduction in the cost in medical electronics industry.

2. Advancement in health informatics
Advancement in health informatics helps establish digital or electronic health records. This helps provide information with respect to the patients whenever necessary. The major challenge here is to give timely information to professionals at any part of the world. The present health information system that currently exists has some problem in interacting with one another in computer language. If a system is used to interact with spoken language rather than computer language then this challenges can be over come.

3. Engineering better medicines
To engineer better medicines is important as we have entered the period of personalized medicine. It is necessary to understand the patient’s condition and then give the medication. In the coming days, drugs and other treatments will be engineered depending of the individual needs while reducing the side effects otherwise drugs will be given to the clients based on their own specifications. Some other systems of future medical electronics are Body area networks, drug delivery mechanisms and electronic pills.

Body Area Networks (BANs)
These are compact wireless sensors connected to the body. To minimize the maintenance BANs have a long battery life. BANs monitor signs of pulse, blood pressure and blood glucose levels. The sensors on the body send the information to gateways such as PCs or mobile phones and finally to remote physicians. Three main areas where BANs are used are brain monitoring, cardiac monitoring and emotion monitoring.

Drug delivery mechanisms
Advancement in therapeutic methods will happen in the years to come. When compared to the bolus approach, today new methods of drug delivery that are natural are being developed. Improved methods of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine may help eliminate the need for certain drugs or hormonal replacement therapy.

Electronic pills
It does the functions like stimulate damaged tissue, targeted drug delivery for certain types of cancer, measure bio markers or monitor gastric problems. However, for charging those pills a non-toxic power source is necessary. The pill battery is created by taking in the form of pill, which can produce current same as the normal or regular battery. The battery of the pill is made of biodegradable material found in the human body. As the work is in progress, it is expected that this will meet within a short term.

These are major challenge the future advancements in the medical electronics has to meet in the coming days.

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PCBs are basically no other than electronic circuits designed in a beautiful way on an insulating substrate. Apart from the aesthetic appearance, they also bring other benefits like more complex circuiting, easy component placement and better trouble shooting capabilities. The conducting links consist of etched or deposited conducting tracks unlike traditional wire connections.
PCBs have evolved over the years and there are many types of them used in the industry. Their suitability is a function of the application, size and the working environment it has to be used.

An early PCB
The first formal PCB came into effect was a PCB circuit for radio developed by Dr. Paul Eisler. Though the PCB didn’t achieve the deserved recognition in the earlier stages, it only gained importance during the World War II.
The earlier PCB manufacturing techniques were mainly based on neat circuiting for reliability and durability but the reduction in size came as an added advantage. The manufacturing process were mainly based on chemical acid etching method and turret boards.

Current trend
Today’s approaches to PCB manufacturing are far superior than the earlier techniques with more merits like size reduction, working environment suitability and extensive enhancement in data transfer capabilities.

In simple applications, single and double sided PCB boards are used. Single sided PCBs are conductively etched on one surface and the other surface is used for soldering the legs of the components to be mounted on the circuit. In double sided PCB boards, the other side is also etched or left fully cladded to allow it to be used for signal source or ground common.

The more advanced multilayer PCB were used for massive size reduction and added features in a lesser space. The multilayer PCB consisted of multiple layers of designed circuit boards sandwiched together with the help of a non conducting laminating material in between.

With technological advancement, the PCB has not lagged behind. To keep in pace with the industry, software applications for circuit designing were invented. With this, the 2D and 2.5D trend in the PCB manufacturing started booming giving them an extra edge over their earlier counterparts. They have reduced dimensions, more features and better data transfer capabilities. With latest tools available, the track resolution as small as a few 1000th parts of an inch can be achieved.

Significance of PCBs
The significance of PCBs can not be overlooked. It has revolutionized the consumer and industrial electronics. As a result, we can now witness the miniaturization of gadgets and equipment within a short span of time. They come now loaded with extra features at the same time. The mass production of the PCB has reduced the cost of manufacturing and has helped the electronic industry to cater to the need of consumer in a more economical way. As a result, the technology has become cheaper and is easily accessible. It has led to over all development of the living status and the mankind in whole.

Future prospects
The future is likely to see more new applications and innovation. This is likely to happen: with the dimensions getting smaller, more features will get loaded and extremely fast data transfer capabilities. The development of the 3D technology and the quest for new materials are on to meet the needs and expectations of rapidly transforming electronic industry. With the developments expected to be concluded in due time, we can expect to witness healthy and important changes in the years come.

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