A pilot clinical study of developing an External Assist Targeting Device for rapid and precise renal calyx access during percutaneous nephrolithotomy.

Objective: To design a device to increase the accuracy of the targeting process and reduce the radiation exposure to both the patients and the medical staff.

Methods: We analyzed the inherent problem and designed the External Assist Targeting Device (EATD) to assist in the alignment of needle targeting on the desired renal calyx under fluoroscopic guidance. The EATD was designed to allow rapid and precise access to calyces at all angles, with a simple two-step puncture protocol developed for puncturing a target renal calyx.

Effects of Sterilization Cycles on PEEK for Medical Device Application.

The effects of the sterilization process have been studied on medical grade thermoplastic polyetheretherketone (PEEK). For a reusable medical device, material reliability is an important parameter to decide its lifetime, as it will be subjected to the continuous steam sterilization process. A spring nature, clip component was selected out of a newly designed medical device (patented) to perform this reliability study.