As we said last week, it was crunch time! This Tuesday we completed our Final Design Review (FDR) documents. These included an executive summary, testing procedures, product manuals, bill of materials, and much much more. We also created a promotional video and digital poster linked here in this post!! Later that day, we presented a live demo to our liaisons as JWM Engineering and gave them a final presentation with all of our testing and specifications. Our liaisons were extremely satisfied with our product and performance, we could not be happier!!

Finally, to the wrap up the day, Vitalis gave live demos to UF students, faculty, family members, friends, and other liaisons as well! Although it was a long day, we finally got to see the fruit of our labor. This year has been an amazing learning experience for all of Vitalis. We are so thankful to all of the UF IPPD staff, JWME, and most importantly our coach Dr. Laura Cruz Castro for the amazing guidance and overwhelming support. Without them this wouldn’t have been possible.

With that, thank you for checking out our blog! Feel free to reach out to any of team Vitalis!

We are approaching FDR very fast! This week was a major crunch for the entire team. We worked very hard to prepare our presentation and ensure that any outlying bugs were squashed as soon as possible. There is still some more work to do, but we’re almost there!

We managed to squeeze in an additional 2 tests at the simulation lab this week to fully make sure we covered our bases with the device. We plan to process the data and make sure it looks great for FDR.

This week we recovered from PID 2 by continuing to work on our project.

Vitalis completed the data pipeline needed to transfer data from the pi in to the server and out to the web app and database. Speaking of the the database, the software team mounted the database on a larger disk to support the testing of different fidelity transcription models.

Although the device can be placed on any flat surface in a hospital room, it is designed to sit on a code cart used during code blue events, positioned next to the defibrillator. To assess potential vibrations from the defibrillator, a frequency study was conducted in SolidWorks to identify the device’s natural frequencies and regions of maximum displacement.

Lastly, the team also created a poster and video for the Final Design Review presentation! Vitalis is so excited to present our year’s worth of work to both our liaisons and the public!

Vitalis was able to demo many new features of our device during last month’s prototype inspection day. We were able to show all and explain the state of our current prototype and also explain and justify the countless decisions we’ve made up until now.

On top of debuting our well-designed chassis, Shands test data, heat test data, battery back up system, transcription demonstrations with our prototype, and our deployed web application, We were able to get a lot of useful feedback on the state of our project and some potential future steps. One piece of advice that will come in handy is the usage of CAD for stress test/drop test simulation. This brought us relief that we didn’t have to consider dropping our model and risk months of work for one test.

Moving forward we want to aim to complete the design of our secure data pipeline and finish conducting our TPMs but also do more tests in Shands’ ICU SIM LAB.

This week, we were mainly focusing on getting back up to speed as we came back to campus from our Spring Break. While we did unplug over the break, we were able to make significant progress especially with the chassis that we’ve been developing and the external server.

As shown below, the Chassis was completely redesigned and reprinted. Now all parts are fully able to be held in the chassis with no issues, and this will be utilized as our main device chassis for the final PID and prototype!

We also were able to make significant progress with the external server, allowing the webapp to actually be seen and utilized on mobile / computer devices connected to the internet!

We are excited to not only finalize all functionality for PID but also get the opportunity to hear feedback from SMEs. Can’t wait to see everyone next Tuesday, good luck!

This week, we made a huge step forward by wiring up our safe shutdown button! This button now allows users to turn off the device while avoiding corruption and data loss. These are key components in protecting patient health information and help ensure that we process the complete audio data. Below are figures showing the button cover and where the button is going to sit on the chassis.

This week we also implemented a function in our web app that allows certain users (doctors) to sign off on the transcript and summary data. By signing off, they confirm that the information in the transcript and summary is accurate. This feature is important for product liability.

Lastly, the team is writing a ground truth transcript from the audio we gathered in the ER simulation last week. We hope to update the blog next week on our progress!

This week was incredibly eventful for this team. The main highlight included testing the ER. After last week’s unfortunate cancellation of the test on Friday the 20th, we were able to reschedule for this past Thursday and iron out many issues that were present! Upon arriving at Shands, the team was shocked at the scale and how interconnected it all was.

Throughout the test, the nurses were speaking rather quietly which was a little bit concerning however, the results were better than we expected. We had used a cellphone as a control in this test and compared the transcript results of our device compared to an Iphone and were very pleasantly surprised to see that our device outperformed the cellphone by a very large margin. This experience has given us new motivation to keep working and get this project done right!

This week, Vitalis made progress in integrating a camera with our prototype, and worked an OCR (Optical Character Recognition) system for reading patient data. Additionally, the team completed iterating on the design of our chassis. This culminated another print of our chassis, in preparation for usability testing! This print can be seen in the image above. We had prepared to go to a code simulation event at the PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit) at UF Shands but, we had to reschedule due to events outside our control.

Vitalis is excited to have a great first chassis iteration and plan to begin testing at Shands in one of their ICUs during a faux code call! Our first iteration features an easy to use interface and with a small scale network to handle non-local computation of clinician transcriptions! Currently, we are seeing that our device can support 6 hours of uptime when disconnected from wired power, relying solely on the battery pack! This is a crucial functionality we are working towards to ensure that we have the highest possible availability, including during a power outage.

Along with the developments of the chassis, Vitalis has also decided on a single database schema that allows us to unify necessary details to organize user recordings, ICU information, and HIPPA-necessary audit logs.

Lastly, our IaaS provider has gotten back to us and has given our software subteam the capability to access their resources and create VM instances that will manage the external computing after we have working local systems.

The week of January 30th was packed for team Vitalis! First, on Tuesday, the team defended their current design implementations/self-ratings in various categories in front of a panel of judges. Our team planned accordingly and did our very best, and we’re proud to say that we’re more than on track in most objectives; not that we’re surprised!

Additionally, our week has arrived at an exciting conclusion with the arrival of our very first Chassis! The Chassis was manufactured using the Stratsys F370 industrial-grade printer in ASA material. We plan to begin validation testing with the new device components within the next week. After that, we plan to head back to the SIM lab at Shands to conduct more in-depth tests and make sure our device is optimized for the hospital setting. We’re so excited to begin finalizing our year-long project!