Medical developers must think differently

The biggest difference between a mainstream embedded application and a medical application is that the medical device usually has to work right all the time, every time. For the majority of embedded applications, it a product has an infrequent error or needs a reboot, it’s a nuisance, but not much more than that. For medical applications, product failure can endanger lives.

To that end, we’ve put together a technical conference to aid designers working on medical applications. Called DesignMED, the conference is co-located with the Embedded Systems Conference in Boston, on September 27-28.

DesignMED consists of two tracks. The first track covers “system design,” meaning that it looks at traditional embedded topics, like wireless connectivity, processor and OS selection, power management, etc. However, it explains what’s required when these products are being deployed in medical applications.

The second track explains some of the terminology that may be foreign to embedded designers, specifically regarding regulatory.

The whole DesignMED program kicks off with a Keynote Address delivered by Charles Sodini, a professor at MIT. He’ll discuss his discoveries in the field of medical electronics.

Richard Nass