If you find the term 'healthcare engineering' a bit bamboozling, don't worry, you're not alone. 'Engineering' usually brings to mind images of bridges and buildings. Healthcare engineering is essentially using maths and science to solve healthcare problems. This covers an incredibly broad range of activities – from 3D-printed prosthetic limbs to artificial intelligence to predict cancer. At the UCL Institute of Healthcare Engineering, our mission is to develop digital and medical technologies that transform lives across the globe. In the 'Health in a Handbasket' podcast series, we meet the people behind these amazing innovations and how they're making a positive difference. We chat with them about their work, what gets them out of bed in the morning, and how they go to where they are today.

Health in a Handbasket

When was the last time you gave any thought to your sense of smell? Smell plays a vital role in our physical and mental health - from our enjoyment of food and perfume to our ability to detect smoke or gas. A decline in our sense of smell is associated with cognitive decline, BUT there might be things we can do to prevent this happening and train our sense of smell. Giada Brianza is developing a smell training device that could help people track and develop their smell abilities over time. 

For more information and to access the transcript:  
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-episode-1-how-underrated-our-sense-smell 

Date of episode recording: 2023-06-07
Duration: 00:30:07
Language of episode: English
Presenter:Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Giada Brianza
Producer: Cerys Bradley; Alice Hardy

How underrated is our sense of smell?

AI is starting to play a part in our every day lives - it's there when we unlock our phones with Face ID or we use ChatGPT and other variations. But how can we use AI in healthcare, safely? Peter Woodward-Court is using AI to help radiologists diagnose patients from scans. He'll be covering what AI is, how it works and how we can use it safely. About Peter Woodward-Court: Peter is a medical doctor and PhD student in machine learning. He will explain what machine learning actually is, in a way we can all understand. Machine learning requires lots of training data to ‘learn’. But this real-life data can be hard to get hold of for a number of reasons. Peter’s research involves developing synthetic data to train machine learning models which can help diagnose medical conditions - making life easier for doctors and patients.

For more information and to access the transcript: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-episode-2-will-ai-replace-doctors 

Date of episode recording: 2023-06-05 
Duration: 24:27:00
Language of episode: English
Presenter:Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Peter Woodward-Court
Producer: Alice Hardy; Cerys Bradley

Will AI replace doctors?

Ken Li is an Associate Professor looking at technology you can use to manage diabetes. He's currently creating a sort of artificial pancreas to help those with diabetes lead less stressful and anxious lives. We're joined in this episode by Melissa Connolly who tells us what life is like as a diabetic and how the device Ken is creating will change her life.

For more information and to access the transcript:  
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-episode-3-pumping-life-future-diabetes-management

Date of episode recording: 2023-06-14
Duration: 27:33:00
Language of episode: English
Presenter:Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Ken Li, Melissa Connolly
Producer: Alice Hardy, Cerys Bradley

Pumping life into the future of diabetes management

In this episode, Ferdouse speaks to Shoba Poduval about health inequalities among ethnic minorities – including childbirth and mental health treatment – and wonders how digital technology could help the situation. Shoba is a GP and clinical academic in UCL’s eHealth unit where she spends her time developing and evaluating digital health services. Shoba has recently completed a secondment at the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities, London region - a part of the Department of Health and Social Care - where she undertook research to support the development of a strategic framework for addressing ethnic health inequalities through an anti-racist health lens.

For more information and to access the transcript: www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-podcast

Date of episode recording: 2023-07-19
Duration: 00:30:09
Language of episode: English
Presenter: Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Shoba Poduval
Producer: Cerys Bradley; Alice Hardy

Health Inequalities Amongst Ethnic Minorities

Peter Snow is a lecturer working in rehabilitation engineering using virtual reality and robotics. He develops systems to help people with phantom limb pain and other conditions. He is also using gaming software to create training tools for surgeons, allowing them to practice complicated procedures in a safe environment.

For more information and to access the transcript: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-episode-5-are-robots-future-rehabilitation

Date of episode recording: 2023-07-18
Duration: 00:25:59
Language of episode: English
Presenter: Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Peter Snow
Producer: Cerys Bradley; Alice Hardy

Are robots the future of rehabilitation?

Lymphedema is a debilitating, incurable condition which causes excessive swelling in the limbs, and disproportionately affects cancer patients. In this episode, we chat to Katherine about the device she's working on to make the lives of those with lymphedema better. She also talks to us about her experience of being a British Asian woman and how she stumbled on (as you do) becoming an engineer. 

For more information and to access the transcript:  
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/healthcare-engineering/health-handbasket-podcast/health-handbasket-episode-6-michelin-man-and-lymphedema

Date of episode recording: 2023-05-22
Duration: 22:23:00
Language of episode: English
Presenter: Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Katherine Wang
Producer: Alice Hardy, Cerys Bradley

Fluid Flow: Lymphedema and Soft Robotics

The care problem. It’s a problem address by every Prime Minister yet we’re still here with an ageing population and more and more people needing care with not enough carers to care for them. So, what are we doing about it? In this episode we talk to Bea about the care crisis in the UK, why she’s working on diagnosing rare forms of dementia and how there’s a certain lack of community in the UK, the "S" word and how we’re going to solve all this. It’s a meaty episode and we hope you enjoy It as much as we enjoyed recording it. 

Date of episode recording: 2023-10-05T00:00:00Z
Duration: 23:47
Language of episode: English
Presenter: Ferdouse Akhter
Guests: Beatrice Taylor
Producer: Alice Hardy; Cerys Bradley

Who cares for me? Finding solutions to dementia care

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