TMC PULSE

t m c » p u l s e | n o v e m b e r 2 0 1 5 6 as adding a sensor to a take-home pill bottle to monitor use—or to customize materials for individ- ual patients. All devices made in the makerspace are sterilized and tested through a quality improvement or institutional review board study before being used on the hospital floor. Located on a patient floor of the John Sealy Hospital, the MakerHealth Space is well situated to ensure that ingenuity and making become embedded in the care delivery process. "We wanted to make certain that the space was in an accessible location for those staff who work with our patients," Marshall said. "Space like that is at a pre- mium in pretty much any health care organization, but we found 120 square feet of temporary workspace so that we could get the space up and running as quickly as possible, and really start to fabricate and prototype." UTMB is in the process of finalizing the construction of a new, larger workshop space in the Jennie Sealy Hospital. They'll be relocating in early 2016. Closer to the bedside than conventional engineer- ing labs and most other medical professionals, nurses are uniquely positioned to spot suboptimal technol- ogy and design breakthrough solutions to improve care. Too often, their ideas float nebulously through the backs of their minds or remain scribbled on a napkin. The makerspace at UTMB provides nurses with direct access to the tools, resources, and expertise to build prototypes and test their ideas. "I think nurses have been innovating ever since Florence Nightingale went over to Crimea to take care of the wounded soldiers there," Marshall said. "While it's probably waxed and waned throughout the history of the profession, nurses have been consistently coming up with ideas about how we can make patients more comfortable, safer, and enable caregivers to be more efficient." "Nurses are at the forefront of care, really," Young added. "They have the most contact with patients, both while the patients are being diagnosed and receiving treatment and then even when they're discharged. Making and prototyping are all about these small, incremental changes that happen at the individual level, so nurses are a really well positioned group to start with. And they're already doing it, which is what's so exciting—they're just too busy to tell any- body about it." Nurses like Jason Sheaffer, who works in UTMB's Blocker Burn Unit, have already seized the opportunity presented by the MakerHealth Space. "Essentially, we're trying to use simple tools to make better use of the resources that we have," he noted. "The engineers at MakerNurse have given us the chance to come up with solutions. That's exactly what I did—I came up here, told them what I was looking at, and we put together a design and built the device." In the Blocker Burn Unit, patients who have sus- tained serious burns lay down on a table, where they're washed via an extendable hose that dispenses filtered We think that one person's innovation could inspire others, so as we catalogue what people come up with, we want to publish those for others to see." Over the past two years, MakerNurse—which has launched mobile makerspaces in several hospitals and nursing schools across the country—has uncov- ered resourceful nurses using everyday materials to improve upon and create new tools and devices that catalyze better ways of caring for patients: cough pillows composed of hospital blankets wrapped in medical tape; tactile patient call buttons using tongue depressors and pieces of silk; popsicle drip cups to keep pediatric patients from making a mess of things. These simple solutions to practical problems demon- strate the blank canvas for innovation that exists in hospitals throughout the country. "Maker spaces are on the rise," said Anna Young, co-founder of MakerNurse. "You're seeing them in schools, libraries and communities, so we're at a time where prototyping tools and materials have become more affordable and the software that interfaces with them is more approachable. You don't need to be an engineer and have an engineering degree to learn how to rapid prototype and design. "What's unique about the MakerHealth Space at UTMB is putting those tools in the context of a health care system that's providing basic care," she added. "When you walk into the space, it's a combination of rapid prototyping tools and materials that you would see in a traditional workshop mixed in with the hospi- tal supply closet." Medical staff can use the makerspace to prototype a new tool, upgrade an existing hospital device—such We wanted to make certain that the space was in an accessible location for those sta who work with our patients. — DAVID MARSHALL Head of Nursing at UTMB

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