Delightful Delhi

Above is the Qutub Minar. It is the oldest Islamic Minar in all of India. It is made of red sandstone and has inscriptions of the Quran. 

We arrived in Delhi on Wednesday morning and headed straight to the Radisson buffet breakfast. The variety of food was absolutely delicious even though we were heavily jet lagged and tired from our long hike to pulpit rock in Norway. After breakfast, the group headed to meet with recent CBID Alumni Anmol Chopra to BD India Headquarters. We learned about BD's efforts in understanding India's healthcare system and attempts to innovate for the extremely poor.

The next afternoon, we headed out to tour Delhi and some of its offerings. 

The team in front of the President's house. 

 After our tour of Delhi, we headed to Haldiram, a chain of restaurants, to have delicious Delhi Chaat. This was the closest we could get to street food without getting ill. We ordered chole bhature, pani puri, bhel puri, and dahi papdi chat. Kevin and Tiffany absolutely loved it and helped Anant and I in devouring everything. Our Delhi Bellies (get it?) were officially stuffed.

 Next morning we head to GB Pant, a massive government hospital to understand the public sector. We chatted with local patients as well as several pacemaker reps to understand various parts of the care pathway from patient diagnosis to treatment. This was our first exposure to the Indian healthcare system and were really excited to learn from as many people as possible.

We also met with Dr. Yadav in Faridabad for lunch. Dr. Yadav is a Cardiologist at B.K. Hospital. He diagnosis patients with various heart diseases. He gave us interesting insights into several of the challenges surrounding the uptake of pacemaker therapies across both rural and urban patients. From the left - Nitesh (Medtronic India Rep), Dr. Yadav, Wade (Medtronic US), Anant, Kevin, and Pratik (me).

After meeting with Dr. Yadav, we met the rest of the team at Escorts Hospital. Escorts is a private hospital that serves a lot of the upper - middle class of Delhi. We had a brief meeting with the director of the Electrophysiology department who was able to shed light into some of the challenges surrounding pacemaker implantation. 

To the left is a picture of advertising for a dissolving drug eluting stents. Many of the illustrations and claims on the poster were not completely accurate. 

We found an awesome jazz place by IIT Delhi. The venue was full of international travels and young Indians looking for a good time in Delhi. We quickly realized from the prices and ambiance (still cheap for USA) that this was the upper middle class and that most of the people in the government hospitals we saw earlier in the day could not afford the cover charge for this place (300 rupees). 

Last Days in Stavanger & Arrival in New Delhi!

At the harbor in Stavanger

We spent the last couple days learning about global health innovation at Laerdal and enjoying the history and beauty of Stavanger.  At Laerdal we got to see some exciting new technologies such as the SimMan 3D used for CPR training. We also got a glimpse into the product development process for MamaNatalie, a birthing simulator used for training in maternal and newborn care. It’s pretty amazing how a simple, affordable design can make such a large impact!

After hearing about all these designs, we had a workshop where we went through the process of designing the ideal wallet for one of our classmates. We learned about digging deeper into a problem to gain a better understanding behind certain preferences, wants, and needs, and seeking user feedback to improve our designs.

Walking through Old Stavanger

The workshops at Laerdal were really great for having a broader exposure to some of our classmates’ global health focuses. We were even able to practice neonatal resuscitation skills with NeoNatalie and experiment with a couple fetal heart rate monitoring prototypes.

Our adventures in Norway were just as exciting! On Monday we visited a medieval monastery, Utstein Abbey. Tore Laerdal took us on a tour explaining the lifestyle of the Augustinian monks and some interesting stories behind each of the rooms. We got to sit down in the Abbey and enjoy a beautiful concert as well.

Tiffany and Pankti at Pulpit Rock

Tuesday was our last full day in Norway. We went for a hike to Pulpit Rock, a cliff 600 meters above Lysefjord. After a couple tumbles, wrong turns, and possibly a lost shoe, the whole group made it to the top of the cliff. Despite the mist, the hike was pretty incredible, especially when it started to clear up on our way down and we could see the stunning views.

Hiking up to Pulpit Rock in the fog

Wednesday afternoon we rushed to the airport to catch our flight from Stavanger --> Frankfurt --> Munich --> New Delhi, our destination! We finally landed early Thursday morning and met up with a CBID alumni in the afternoon. Today is Eid al-Fitr, so we are excited to take the day off and explore the city. We will keep you updated!

On the plane, headed to New Delhi

Stavanger, NORWAY! Fjord Boat Ride / Dinner

After about an hour rest at the hotel, we went on a walking Tour guided by Tore Laerdal himself! Laerdal is a key partner with CBID and brings supply chain and manufacturing expertise to our global health projects. After the tour, we took an hour long boat ride through the Lysefjord. I can speak for everybody in saying that the breathtaking view and cool breeze on top of the boat definitely outweighed everybody's intense jet lag. Here are a couple of pictures: 

Pankti (left) and Barrett (right) on top of the boat. 

Barrett, Jenny, Julia, Kevin, and Aaron

We also stopped and gathered fresh water from a waterfall that feeds into the fjord before it becomes salty. It was slightly brown, which according to locals is just the presence of minerals (?), but tasted better than bottled water. 

Kevin enjoying his all natural glass of water. 

Brinnon, Dr. Acharya, and Tore Laerdal. 

On our way back to Stavanger, we made  stop at this awesome restaurant. The whole place was booked by Laerdal for CBID. We chilled here for about 2-3 hours eating, skipping rocks, and taking crazy photos. 

Our feast

More food.

We got back to the hotel and everybody passed out by 10 pm. 

Departure

Hey Guys, Pratik here! Recapping the departure and past couple of days. 

En route to meeting up with the group to leave for the airport. From Left: Michael, Kevin, and Me.

CBID '14 group photo prior to leaving for Norway outside Mason Hall. August 03, 2013.

Funny pose with Baby Yates in the air!












18 of us split up into 2 vans and made our way to Dulles International. The Flight was pretty fun, though most of us barely slept because of the excitement. The five of flew on a different flight and stopped at Frankfurt.

Introduction

नमस्ते !

The Team

Kevin Keenahan 

Pratik Patel 

Anant Subramaniam

Tiffany Tseng 

Brock Webberman

The Goal 

The goal of our time in India is to understand the diagnosis and treatment of AV block and sick sinus syndrome. These diseases are often treatable with the implantation of pacemakers. However, for a number of reasons, the majority of the Indian population either is not aware of the disease or does not have access to the treatment options. We will look for key insights by talking to a diverse group of stakeholders both in urban and rural areas of India.

Of course, we'll also be having fun with the culture and all fun opportunities as they present themselves.

The Program 

We are a group of five graduate biomedical engineering students traveling to India with the Center for Bioengineering Innovation & Design (CBID). This year's CBID class has a total of 18 students. Our fellow colleagues have also split up into groups and will be traveling to Kenya, Tanzania, Nepal, and other parts of India. We have spent the last two months finding and validating unmet clinical needs at the Johns Hopkins Hospital for the US/European Markets. The second part of our program is to innovate for the world for which we are immersing ourselves in the global health environments for which we want to innovate for. 

More information: 

The Partnership 

Medtronic is providing invaluable mentorship for our project. Leading engineers from the company will travel with us to India to help us better understand various challenges of the market.