As one of the younger designers at Bridge, and a person whom remembers very little prior to the mid
1980’s, I have come to take certain things for granted. As a member of contemporary society, the
internet, e-mail, and advanced computing have become so ingrained in the fabric of everyday life
that I often forget to take a step back to appreciate and even stand in awe of the modern
conveniences that make life, and more specifically, work, so efficient and, in some cases, much
more painless than they would be otherwise.

Once in a while I stumble across a reminder of how daily life would be without many of the
technological advances that have become so ubiquitous in my work day.  The short film
“Design story: The Decanter” created as a promotional video for the design firm Landor & Assoc. in
1960 is one such reminder.  As I watched this film I was amazed at the amount of effort and the
laborious steps that went into the design of a simple whiskey decanter.  Even as a student, with
limited resources and finances, I was afforded many more luxuries than the professional designers
of that era.  As each scene played out I could list in my head numerous modern tools at my
fingertips that the designers at Landor had no difficulty doing without.  Looking at the totally
analog, manual design process in this video, I can appreciate the great skill and craftsmanship that
was a standard part of industrial design 50 years ago.

I do recognize that some legs of the design process have changed very little since the time of this
film, but with the introduction of such technological advances as e-mail, 3-D CAD, and rapid
prototyping these processes have become less cumbersome and much more streamlined.  My hat is
definitely off to the designers of the 1950s and 1960s.

Enjoy the video.




-Chris, Senior Industrial Designer

Finally our new web site is up and running – thanks to considerable efforts by our ID Director Matt Presta and our Marketing Assistant Caitlin Clarke.  We should also thank our web developer and host Level9. The new site will allow us to update and add new projects much more easily as it has the latest in content management systems to make this easier.  Thanks for visiting and come back as we will be adding new content regularly.

Bill Evans President Bridge Design

Bridge’s views on the future of medical design were featured in an article for this month’s edition of MD&DI Magazine. In the article, President Bill Evans discusses the rise of patient-centric design, using the Stork example we recently featured, and includes a few other important trends we’ve observed.


Above: photo from superDimesion website

Evans writes about the use of gaming industry technology to create new ways of guiding surgeons and interventionists to their quarry, with companies like SuperDimension leading the way. He also discusses our prediction that as electronic medical records (EMRs) become more widespread, there will be a greater possibility of smarter devices that will act independently according to the patient’s medical history, in addition to what the sensors are reading.

Click here to read the full article.

This article reflects Bridge’s more general approach to design thinking – we are always on the lookout for general trends in technology that will have a potential impact on medical product design.  Evans recently returned from a trip to the UK and noted a couple of trends in Europe that are slightly ahead of the U.S. that could eventually find their way into medical products.

First, an example with interesting potential in chronic disease management is a new cell phone-enabled technology on sale in the UK by O2 (a large carrier) called the Joggler. It’s a family-oriented “central” organizer (think a touch screen family calendar you keep on the fridge door). It is inexpensive and serves as a way of coordinating family activities by texting reminders to all family members and generally being a place to keep common family information.  It has a large touch screen, is video capable and is rumored to allow third-party apps to run on it.

Above: The Joggler

Imagine the power of this kind of network-connected appliance that is also connected to you personal cell phone or personal healthcare device in the future.  Applications could be created that become a central place for current information about your health to be stored, text reminders could be sent to your cell phone, your doctor could get monthly reports or be notified about exceptional events triggered by readings from your personal monitors.  When more of these personal health monitors (such as BG meters, pill containers, inhalers, etc.) start talking to each other, this could be a boon to managing chronic conditions such as diabetes, asthma or COPD, obesity etc. where a combination of monitoring compliance or reporting diagnostics could be more powerfully and transparently coordinated.  No need to worry about inputting it to your computer or even bothering to have an internet connection with difficult-to-set-up WiFi connectivity.  The always-on cell link could look after that.

Another interesting trend noted on the same UK trip was a way of making print advertisements more interactive that could have interesting medical applications.  Some innovative marketers have added 2D bar codes to their print ads that are readable with a regular cell phone camera.  The idea, seen on a Volvo car ad in the Guardian Newspaper, is that users snap an image of the small 2D bar code. Because of a previously-installed generic app, the phone knows where to send the bar code and the cell-phone user then gets a link to a video sent to them by return, in this case a video showing a Volvo ad.

What Bill found interesting about this idea is that if this technology takes off, it could become an interesting way of expanding the way in which people with various conditions monitor and manage their health. For instance, Advair inhaler users are supposed to note the exact day they open their inhaler package and stop using it after 30 days, due to its shelf life once opened. Who actually does this?

Instead, if the packaging had this bar code printed on it the user could just snap a photo and 30 days later, they’d get a text saying it was time to open a new one.  Imagine if all foods began carrying this bar code and it was linked via web site to help you manage calorie intake for dieting or carbohydrate intake for people with diabetes. How many users bother to read those obscure, icon-laden instructions for use (IFUs)?  What if the packaging for that complex device had this 2D barcode: the healthcare professionals could photograph it on their iPhone camera and then immediately see a short IFU video in their local language that shows them in better-animated terms how to correctly use it?

Bill put together a short list of directions for how to do this yourself:

First, download the free “scanbuy” app to your phone (we tested it on an iPhone but it’s also available to many other phones) from scanlife. You must have this app on your phone for it to work.

Next, aim your camera phone at one of the barcodes below on the computer screen. The first bar code will lead your phone web browser to the Bridge Design blog; the second one will lead to a video demonstration of how to use a product we designed, Cleo (you’ll need to click through on the video to run it). The bar code will work from print, computer, and television. Take a picture.

Above: Cleo video 2-D bar code

Bridge 2-D bar code

Did it take you to our website blog, or to the video? The possibilities are enormous — get on with applying it!

From our vantage point of spending a great deal of time in the field and always working on the next great medical product that’s 2 to 5 years away from release, we have an interesting relationship to medical product design trends.  On the one hand we help establish the trends with the products we do. On other hand we observe changing cultural trends and incorporate those into our design thinking.

One of the larger trends we are seeing is that some of the thinking behind what makes a great consumer product is finding its way into forming medical products, especially those that are very patient-centric in their use.  Nowhere is this more obvious than in application specific products where we have an opportunity to design for a much more specific group of users, the product can be designed for a much better patient experience without the need to be all-things to all users like many of the general medical products out there.  To give an example of this trend and be able to show it now the Bridge ID team designed our interpretation of what an ultrasound device could be like in the near future.  Our press release below.

San Francisco – April 6, 2009 – Bridge Design, Inc. - Portability is the fastest growing segment in the ultrasound market. Imagine fast-forwarding a few years when technology becomes less expensive and more powerful and compact. What would a birthing-specific ultrasound, designed specifically for the mother–to-be, look like?San Francisco-based Bridge Design has come up with an innovative, mother-centric device that focuses on making the ultrasound experience pleasant and hassle-free. The Stork provides a number of features not yet on the market, including a second display so the mother won’t have to strain her neck to look at the screen. It also allows the mother to email electronic images directly to family and friends from the device instead of receiving paper printouts. Unlike the average ultrasound machine, the Stork is unintimidating, even playful, with a flip screen and basket-like portability which contains “cup holders” for probe and gel. The Stork’s color, materials, and finishes forgo the clinical white and gray palette for a much more soothing birthing experience.Bridge’s Director of Industrial Design, Matt Presta, who also happens to be a parent, explains:“Any mother who has had an ultrasound is familiar with the cart of equipment, probes, gels, screens, printouts, and everything else that comes with it. And although the experience is necessary for clinical reasons, many parents just want to see their baby. For years, Bridge has observed trends clearly pointing towards designing for the patient’s experience. Since we’re still a few years away from seeing the tipping point of the patient-centric trend in health care, we wanted to provide a glimpse into the future based on what we’re seeing happening in the industry.”It’s worth noting that although this device has not yet been manufactured it reflects a trend that Bridge sees growing, with more application-specific medical products likely to appear at healthcare facilities in the not-too-distant future. “As a given technology matures, its cost and size typically shrinks. This opens up exciting possibilities to those forward-thinking medical equipment manufacturers who understand that if you change your design thinking to be more user and patient-centric, then new market opportunities can be created. Addressing baseline functionality and reliability at low cost is not enough to stay ahead of the game in mature markets,” says Presta.

A description of services can be found at http://www.bridgedesign.com.  SOURCE Bridge Design, Inc.  Contact Matt Presta of Bridge Design, Inc. +1-415-487-7100, ext 300, mpresta@bridgedesign.com