Biomedical instrumentation centre at PGI within six months

Charu Chhibber

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 22

The PGI is all set to get a biomedical instrumentation centre. If all goes as planned, the centre will be operational within the next six months. The centre is being developed in collaboration with the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Union Ministry of Science and Technology.

It will provide a platform to scientists to promote innovative remedies for varying challenges faced in hospitals. It will also be a platform for brainstorming on innovation in biomedical instruments through workshops, seminars and other activities.

Giving information, Dr GD Puri, Head, Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, PGI, said the biomedical instrumentation centre would be a common place for industry players and academia to work together for development, testing, enhancement, improvisation and commercialisation of biomedical instruments and devices.

“In order to achieve the objective of implementing the innovative idea and making it available for a larger section of population, it is crucial that representatives of the industry and commerce dealing with manufacturing and supply work in tandem,” he said.

“It is important to involve experts from the medical field into production of biomedical instruments from the beginning so that testing can be done in clinical situations and improvements are made so as to facilitate commercialisation of the product,” he said.

Notably, the PGI had sent three proposals, including one in November last year and another in January this year, to the DST for setting up of a biomedical instrumentation centre at the institute.

The PGI authorities also collected data from surrounding technical institutes such as Central Scientific Instrumentation Organisation (CSIO), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Mohali, PEC University of Technology, Semiconductors Limited (SCL), Mohali, and INST, Mohali, among others.

“Basically, we did matchmaking to find out doctors and industry players who would be interested in collaborating for development of biomedical instrumentation. Then, we called a meeting with the DST and gave a presentation. Initially, 12 projects were formulated,” said Dr Puri, adding that approval and funding for the centre were expected within a couple of months.