“Made in India”: How’s that for an indigenous medical device?

• Main Author: Ganne S. Umamaheswara Rao
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Thieme Medical Publishers, Inc. 2013-05-01
• Series: Indian Journal of Neurosurgery
• Subjects: equipment; health-care economics; indigenization; medical devices; regulation
• Online Access: http://www.thieme-connect.de/DOI/DOI?10.4103/2277-9167.118115

With increasing costs of imported equipment, there is a need for Indigenization of medical devices in India. The resources including skilled manpower to develop equipment of a good standard are available in the country. What plagues the developmental process is the lack of adequate interaction between the medical profession and the technologists and reluctance of the industry to venture into the medical device manufacturing. A much bigger and more serious road-block is the lack of formal certification and regulatory processes for these devices. Medical practitioners should be open to evaluating and accepting indigenous equipment that pass the requisite standards. Formal mechanisms should be developed to orient both physicians and engineers to the technical and commercial issues of device development.