Jul
11
2019

2019 interns take on seven innovation projects

by
Sister M. Pieta
Innovation Engineer
OSF Innovation is excited to welcome another class of interns this summer, taking on projects that could turn into real solutions for OSF HealthCare, its medical professionals and the patients it serves. More than 20 students are participating in this year’s program.

With backgrounds in different types of engineering, human-centered design, software development, graphic design, data analysis, medicine and marketing, the interns will spend two months at the Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center working in collaborative teams.

They will work with Jump Simulation, Healthcare Analytics, Complex Solutions Innovation, the OSF HealthCare Illinois Neurological Institute and the OSF Office of Innovation Management on everything from developing new task trainers to building a prototype for an app to better connect patients and providers. The students will have mentors helping them throughout the process.

2019 summer intern projects

PNC Bedside STEAM: This team consists of Jessica Potter (Bradley University graduate), Warren Guiles (BU), Chase Kurkowski (BU), Taylor Ann Isaia (Millikin University) and Connor Purvis (St. Ambrose University). They are working with the Jump Medical Visualization and engineering teams to enhance a hands-on kit called, “Rube-E,” and begin development of an advanced augmented reality activity book. This project is a continuing effort that many Mission Partners at Jump have contributed to starting in 2018, with significant involvement by last year’s college intern team, for patients at OSF HealthCare Children’s Hospital of Illinois.

Brachytherapy Trainer: Reid Jockisch (University of Illinois), Mitchell Schaffer (University of Iowa), Nikita Tummalapalli (U of I), Allison Geralyn Apke (BU) and Kaleb Reecy (BU) are working with the bioengineering team at Jump to create a device that trains clinicians how to perform brachytherapy, a procedure where radioactive material is placed inside the body for cancer treatment.

Research: Isaac Tudor (Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine at Seton Hill) is collaborating with Jump Research to develop curriculum centered on Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosive (CBRNE) Triage and Management using a virtual reality education platform. This curriculum will teach health care professionals how to recognize and treat CBRNE-related injuries in an engaging and immersive way.

iLearn: This group of students includes Brett Austin (University of Illinois Chicago), Jamie Blue (Knox College), Luke Buchen (Illinois State University), James Kellock (Northwestern University), Saad Kothawala (UIC), Andrew Meister (University of Illinois College of Medicine Peoria) and Falguni Deshpande (UI). They will join the Complex Solutions Innovation team to develop a virtual reality module that Community Health Workers can use to increase the health literacy of vulnerable populations.

Value Dashboard: Zach Weinzimmer (Saint Louis University) is collaborating with the Jump Education team to generate an automated electronic dashboard that aggregates data in support of demonstrating the value of simulation-based education programming.

Patient and Provider Communication Tool: This team includes Imran Babar (UIC), Brennan Carlyle (BU), Divya Jose (BU) and Shreel Patel (BU). They will work with Healthcare Analytics and the OSF Office of Innovation Management to build a prototype for a digital platform that individualizes patient care, better connects providers to their patients and can be used for proactive care and treatment.

SNAP Neurology Learning Platform: Lizzie Perkins (BU) is helping OSF HealthCare Illinois Neurological Institute, the OSF Office of Innovation Management and Jump Medical Visualization to create a platform that gathers detailed information about techniques and thought processes around neurology from residents and physicians in order to come up with new neurology diagnostic tools.

Program evolution

When the intern program launched at Jump in 2012, the idea was to pair engineers with clinicians to solve health care problems. Since then, the program has taken on many different shapes with engineering students building simulation devices and some immersing themselves in the clinical environment to find opportunities for additional training.

Now, in its seventh year of operation, the summer intern program has grown to not only include a variety of educational backgrounds—but to help teams across OSF Innovation explore solutions impacting patient care. As always, we look forward to the end-products these students will put together.

Thank you to the team of Mission Partners at Jump and all those who have and will contribute time to develop the interns and the success of the program! 

Featured Author

Photo of Sister M. Pieta

Sister M. Pieta , F.S.G.M., is an Innovation Engineer for Jump. Sister entered the Sisters of St. Francis of the Martyr St. George in Alton, Illinois in 2013. Joining our team in 2018, she is working in the segmentation and virtual reality space for clinical and education use, simulation trainer design and STEAM education in the community and hospital.    Before entering the convent she obtained a Biomedical Engineering degree from Purdue University. During her years of study, she was a design engineering co-op for a minimally invasive surgical company. Some of her projects at Purdue included team development of designs for a CPAP, reusable EKG pads to be used in developing countries and a prototype for a left ventricular assist device. After graduation, she began working at OSF HealthCare Saint Anthony’s

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Categories: Augmented Reality (AR), Bioengineering, Children's Hospital of Illinois (CHOI), Collaboration, Illinois Neurological Institute (INI), Innovation, Internships, Medical Visualization, OSF Innovation, Research, Simulation, Task Trainer, Virtual Reality (VR)