Bio Engineering

Falls and fall-related injuries are a major challenge to health and care systems and to the older people who suffer them. Around one in three people over 65 and one in two people over 80 fall at least once each year. Falls account for around 40 per cent of all ambulance call-outs to the homes of people over 65 and are a leading cause of older people’s use of hospital beds. Each year there are around twice as many fractures resulting from falls as there are strokes in the over 65s. Hence, the orthopedic implant sector forms a significant portion of the worldwide biomedical industry. Direct medical costs from fragility fractures to the UK healthcare economy were estimated at £1.8 billion in 2000, with the potential to increase to £2.2 billion by 2025. Prime examples of widely-used technology would include prosthetic hip and knee replacements for various types of arthritis affecting these joints, spinal fusion instruments for stabilizing degenerate and unstable vertebral segments, and fracture fixation devices of various types such as plates, screws and intramedullary rods.
In the following, our research projects in this area are presented:

• Investigating the Composite Orthopedic Plates under Impact Loading (more info)