. - Mercy Health St Vincent Medical Center is getting a close up look at how 3D printing can help better patient care. It's all part of a statewide project that brings together manufacturers from across the state.
Mercy health physicians will later be trained on how to use these 3D printing machines.
"We're also hoping that there's an opportunity for these physicians to utilize their new ideas, maybe companies will support them in that effort and hopefully it creates jobs in our community," said Megan Reichert with Director of Innovation for Mercy Health Northern Region.
The Center for Innovative Food Technology or CIFT helped pull everyone together as part of this statewide project.
"We have people that make the filament to the people that make the printers..to be able to have an orthotic specialist involved so that they can really demonstrate and validate whether or not this is gonna work," said Rebecca Singer, President and CEO at CIFT.
Project collaborators said this is a way to get patients better and faster service. Participants not only got to see how technology could work for humans but also for animals.
One of the examples that was given during Tuesday's presentation was of Laney, a three legged dog that might be used as an example to demonstrate how 3D technology could work for her as well.
Next steps included continuing to develop new materials and methods for manufacturing materials.
"Testing and proving that they're acceptable for medical applications and then helping to commercialize those opportunities," said Reichert.
