Jeonbuk National University Hospital Professor Ko Myung-hwan's Team Achieves Technology Transfer Success for 3 Consecutive Years [Medical News Reporter Cha Won-jun]

Professor Ko Myung-hwan's team at Jeonbuk National University Hospital achieves technology transfer success for three consecutive years
Successful industrialization through technology transfer from the Medical Device Translational Clinical Support Center
'Hip brace' enabling effective rehabilitation after 2019 hip surgery‘

[Medical Newspaper/Daily Health News = Reporter Cha Won-jun] The 'Medical Device Translational Clinical Support Center,' led by Professor Ko Myung-hwan of the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine at Jeonbuk National University Hospital, is attracting attention for achieving technology transfer results for three consecutive years.

According to Jeonbuk National University Hospital on the 11th, a team consisting of Professors Ko Myung-hwan and Kim Ki-wook from the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine and Professor Yoon Sun-joong from the Department of Orthopedics developed a 'hip brace' for the rapid and effective rehabilitation of patients after hip surgery and signed a technology transfer agreement with 'Disk Doctor,' a manufacturer and developer of corrective and assistive devices, last March.

Unlike conventional metal braces that are uncomfortable to wear, this hip brace utilizes inflatable tubes to conform closely to the human body shape, providing comfortable and stable protection for the hip joint. This technology reduces the load on the hip joint and appropriately restricts excessive joint movement of the thigh, thereby lowering the risk of recurrent hip injury after surgery and facilitating rapid and effective rehabilitation.

Prior to this, Professor Ko Myung-hwan's team transferred the 'functional game for speech therapy and nasal tone measurement technology' for patients with speech disorders, which was developed through research collaboration with Professor Yoo Hee-cheon's team at POSTECH in 2018, to Humanopia, a speech therapy device developer.

In addition, in 2017, we researched and developed a 'virtual reality rehabilitation training device with a variable tool module' to restore cognitive and hand function decline caused by dementia and brain diseases, and transferred the technology to Cybermedic, a rehabilitation medical device manufacturer. These technologies have successfully completed objective clinical trials and are currently being used effectively in the medical field.

This achievement is attracting attention from both industry and academia as a successful case of leading the entire lifecycle of medical device development—from new technology development to prototype production, efficacy verification, product licensing, and final commercialization—centered around a single platform.

This success is attributed to the efforts of Professor Koh Myung-hwan, who serves as the principal investigator for the Rehabilitation Medical Device Translational Clinical Trial Support Center, a national project under the Ministry of Health and Welfare, to foster close "industry-academia-research-hospital" collaboration among the hospital, university, and companies. Support from Jeonbuk National University Hospital's own research program, the "Project for Identifying Clinical Research Projects in Healthcare R&D and Fostering Technology Development," also played a key role in achieving this result.

Professor Koh Myung-hwan said, “Since 2015, through the Rehabilitation Medical Device Translational Clinical Trial Support Center project supported by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, we have been providing support such as consulting, product approval, patents, clinical trials, and medical consultation to domestic small and medium-sized rehabilitation medical companies.” He added, “Moving forward, to continue active research on the development of advanced medical devices, we will further strengthen the joint research network between industry, academia, and research institutes centered on hospitals to support the realization of researchers” clinical ideas and strive to help domestic companies create the world’s best medical devices.”.

Source: Medical News (https://www.bosa.co.kr)