Formlabs
3D printed medical device firm restor3d says it is on a mission to ‘empower’ surgeons and healthcare providers who repair and reconstruct the human body. The company has been using Formlabs 3D printers to help in achieving its goal.
restor3d says that traditional instrumentation systems are slow to evolve, have significant upfront costs, and often present complications in the surgical workflow. The company says it leverages 3D printing capabilities to improve surgical care delivery by printing procedure-specific and patient-specific metal implants and polymer instrumentation.
The company has a fleet of over 25 Formlabs 3D printers in its production line. The systems are helping restor3d to replace large, expensive surgical trays with single-use, procedure specific tools, reduce supply chain and sterilisation costs for hospitals, and reduce the need for intraoperative navigation systems via patient-specific instrumentation according to the company.
Cambre Kelly, Chief Technology Officer, restor3d said: “We were developing an innovative implant that has features that are only achievable with 3D printing, but expecting surgeons to use a very traditional instrument system to deliver the implant. So we realised pretty quickly that evolving the instrument offering alongside the implant innovation was going to be an important differentiator for us.”
Speaking about the high cost of instrumentation trays Kelly said: “Traditional instrument trays are typically machined from stainless steel and cost upwards of 50,000 USD per tray. As a medical device manufacturer, if you’re going to make the investment into buying 10 instrument trays at 50,000 USD each, you’re going to be locked into using those for a really long time. You’re really not going to be willing to iterate the design, throw away a tray, and start from scratch or change some seemingly small features.”
restor3d’s surgical tools combine metal and polymer parts, and are created to replace the fully stainless steel instruments used by surgeons. The company says its engineering team assesses the range of materials in order to find a polymer that could handle threading and would stand up to use during the surgical procedure after either gamma or steam sterilisation.
Vice President of Patient Specific Engineering at restor3d Ben Wesorick said: “The reason that we like Formlabs resin materials is their inter-operative characteristics. Primarily, they’re tough. They allow us to print what we want without too much concern about material thinning or breaking.
“We’ve actually seen these be pretty resistant for things like impactors and cutting tools and drilling guides. So they really provide surgeons with pretty good tactile feedback. I would say the other thing that these materials do for us really well is that they’re flexible from a design perspective.”
Nathan Evans, Senior Vice President of Product Development said: "Surgeons are most comfortable with what they trained with. And if they trained 20 or 30 years ago, this technology might not have been available. We see adoption really start to pivot when surgeons see case reports from some of their peers and see the outcomes that are able to be achieved with technology that they have not yet tried and how it's unlocking new value, new outcomes, new approaches or clinical workflows."
According to Kelly, restor3d is ‘just getting started’. The company is beginning to make plans for expansion into foot and ankle operations as well as different spinal surgeries. restor3d also says that additional orthopedic applications such as trauma, upper extremity, and sports medicine aren’t far behind.
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