Q&A: Jamestown Plastics discusses the process behind designing medical devices

After it was announced that Jamestown Plastics had designed a cost-effective solution to thermoformed medical trays, Medical Plastics News spoke to Jay Baker, CEO, about the process behind the design.

You designed a more cost-effective solution for a medical device company. Could you tell us more about that? 

A customer approached us who was frustrated by the continued increasing cost of the material used in their packaging for more than a decade. They asked us how we could help. I pointed out that they were stuck with the one supplier that makes this resin, who controls the market. While there were other materials that would perform, they would need to go through the pain and aggravation of the approval process, which was not an option. So, my design team and I were able to make the same product using less material, therefore saving money. 

We looked at this with a clean sheet of paper when we designed it, doing our own testing. We were able to use half as much material while gaining three times the crush strength of the existing product. By incorporating structural geometry, we gained tremendous strength and used less material.  

The real challenge is when things look different or are perceived to be different, it may raise red flags in the medical device industry. We had to think outside the box, which we love to do, and were able to solve a problem for our customer. We do this daily by improving product performance, reducing product cost, saving manufacturing time, eliminating shipping damage, and more.  

What do you think are the biggest challenges in designing products for the medical industry? 

When you look at thermoformed packaging in the medical device industry, much of it has not changed since the 1950s and 60s when it comes to basic design.  

In medical device manufacturing, when something has been approved and is working, there needs to be a very good reason to change it. The penalties for failure are so high; if something doesn’t work, it could affect somebody's life. Unfortunately, what happens is innovation stultifies, because the stakes are so high, and the approval process is so arduous. 

Do you usually have sustainability in mind when designing, or is it more what the customer is after? 

The answer is yes and yes. We always have sustainability in mind. We try to accomplish the tasks set before us, using the least amount of the appropriate material that we can, while also trying to ensure that if there's a recycling stream available that there's no cross contamination, which prevents products from being recycled. There’s also the importance of products having to be sterilised in the healthcare market. 

Is it rare to have opportunities where you can be creative in making new designs? 

It’s more of a challenge and I'll get into a little bit of economic philosophy here. If you decide you want to buy yourself a new car, you're going to go to a bunch of different dealerships. You will do your online research to find the things that you like, then you'll go to the car dealership.  

As the consumer, you may go to two or three car dealerships because you figured out which car you want, what colour you want, what options you want: now you're looking for the best deal. With whom do you feel the most comfortable? Who has the best service department? You finally decide, perhaps playing the three different dealerships off one another, and then buy a car.  

When you go into the hospital for a stent, do you research which stent you want? Who's going to provide it? How much you're going to pay for it? Not at all. You're going to go to the hospital and believe the doctor or surgeon taking care of you is going to use the product that he or she thinks should be used.  

Furthermore, the cost of your stent will in most cases be covered by a third party, the insurance provider. This disconnect between the consumer and the manufacturer is unique to this industry. Consumer dollars drives innovation in all other industries. Patient outcome drives innovation in the medical realm, as it should, but this focus greatly reduces the motivation to change anything not directly linked to patient outcomes.