Cutting-edge diagnostic tool Hyperparallel OCT (HP-OCT™) for Ophthalmology and Optometry by Cylite Pty Ltd has been announced as an Australian Engineering Excellence Award winner and Victoria’s 2020 Sir William Hudson Award.
The Sir William Hudson Award is the highest accolade an engineering project can receive from Engineers Australia and will be announced at the national Pinnacles Award Ceremony in November.
Designed, engineered, and manufactured in Australia, the HP-OCT ™ provides complete volume 3D imaging of the eye, along with highly accurate (to the micron level) measurements of the eye’s key optical properties.
The equipment has been designed from the ground up to address the requirements for accurately imaging the properties of the eye by overcoming the eye motion artifacts of existing OCT technologies, and marks the next generation of diagnostic equipment for Ophthalmologists and Optometrists.
According to Chief Technology Officer Grant Frisken, the HP-OCT™ stands to drive significant outcomes for society.
“Cylite’s HP-OCT™ product is designed to streamline the screening process that currently requires a large number of individual diagnostic devices to build a clinical picture of a patient”, said Mr Frisken.
“Enabling more health professionals to routinely screen more patients across the five areas of eye conditions affecting Australians is key for earlier diagnosis, and thus an earlier ability to intervene with treatment where relevant.
“Earlier diagnosis and intervention mitigates the impact of the emotional and financial burden on society that results from many of these avoidable conditions.”
Cylite’s work on the HP-OCT™ is among the first complex optical diagnostic technology to be designed in Australia, adding to the country’s list of impressive biomedical innovations.
Andrew Parkinson, VP Engineering, said the HP-OCT™ sets a benchmark for large format medical device design through seamless integration of key visual design elements with functional and performance requirements.
“There are several elements that position the equipment as a new benchmark in engineering”, said Mr Parkinson.
“The HP-OCT™ pushes the speed limits of image acquisition to 300,000 scans per second, while the current industry average is 60,000.
“Technology traditionally used in telecommunications has been transferred to the medical sector, such as the MLAs used for the parallelism.
The Australian Engineering Excellence Award judges also praised the equipment for its ability to incorporate the modern principles of health and safety, ethical operation, and environmental outcomes to benefit the end user.
This was clear as Mr Parkinson shared some of the decisions which were made when designing the technology, resulting in a piece of equipment that drives significant benefits to its users, patients, and the environment.
“From a health and safety perspective, the Cobalt ergonomic design around chinrest and headband improves on existing instruments in terms of patient comfort during exams”, said Mr Parkinson.
“Our engineered exposure-limit safeguards go well beyond the demonstration of safe limits mandated by the standards, and include not just one but two redundant forms of power monitoring – ensuring that exposure levels will never exceed safe limits.”
The HP-OCT™ is also beneficial to the environment through reducing the number of devices required to screen patients, in turn resulting in a carbon footprint from one device instead of multiple.
“We also decoupled the PC, unlike other fabricators where it is in-built, which improves the longevity of the instrument and reduces waste” said Mr Parkinson.
“We have further reduced waste by designing components such as the imaging system to be a re-useable platform for future products.”
You can learn more about the Australian Engineering Excellence Award winners and Sir William Hudson Award finalists here, and re-watch the September awards ceremonies by logging into the awards platform or EAOnDemand.
The winner of the Sir William Hudson Award will be announced on Monday 9 November during the Pinnacles Award ceremony, which will be broadcast live online.
Image: Supplied by Cylite Pty Ltd