Engineering Ethics

194 Engineering Ethics: An Industrial Perspective

WHAT ARE YOU DOING NOW?

I continue to work with the state occasionally on groundwater problems.

CASE 5: BIOMEDICAL ENGINEER

Ethics Dilemma Scorecard

Public Safety & Welfare



Data Integrity & Representation



Trade Secrets & Industrial Espionage

Gift Giving & Bribery

Principle of Informed Consent



Conflict of Interest

Accountability to Clients & Customers



Fair Treatment



TELL US YOUR STORY

I was working at a medical device startup, reporting to the Vice

President of R&D. The device we were developing attached to the wrist

and was to be used in the hospital operating room. Over the course

of 1 month, a mechanical engineer and I conducted many experiments

on our own wrists. At the end of the month, when our wrists began to

ache, I went to the biomedical library to investigate the cause of this

constant pain.

Through three journal articles, I discovered that I had given myself

carpal tunnel syndrome. The work the other engineer and I had been con-

ducting involved applying pressure to our wrists that, when measured

with an external pressure sensor, exceeded 200 mmHg. According to the

articles, the median nerve within the carpal tunnel would be compromised

if pressure within the carpal tunnel exceeded 9 mmHg below diastolic

blood pressure (typically 60 mmHg). I told my boss that patients using

our device might get injured. Though he thought I was exaggerating and

hypothesized I might have an “unusual” wrist, I kept insisting injury was

possible. Eventually, he asked me to tell our principal investigator of

experiments in the operating room, an anesthesiologist, about my pain.

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Anonymous Industrial Engineering Ethics Cases 195

The anesthesiologist immediately arranged for a meeting with a vascular

surgeon and hand surgeon to discuss my findings.

At this meeting, the CEO, the VP of Marketing, the VP of R&D, a

mechanical engineer, and I discussed my findings with the anesthesiologist,

vascular surgeon, and hand surgeon.The three physicians agreed that I had

given myself carpal tunnel syndrome. Even worse, because the device was

mounted on a steel wrist brace completely encircling the wrist, the two sur-

geons believed that during a long surgery, too little blood would circulate

to the hand, causing tissue necrosis (tissue death). As we left the meeting,

the VP of Marketing joked, “So you go in for hip surgery, but come out

without a hand. Is this bad?!” I did not find this funny.

A few days later, we had our quarterly meeting with our technical advi-

sor, who was also an anesthesiologist. This technical advisor was on the

Board of Directors. When the technical advisor heard about carpal tunnel

syndrome and tissue necrosis, he immediately mandated that the wrist

brace design be changed. After the meeting, he apologized for our pain,

and told the mechanical engineer and me that our company would pay for

any treatment that we needed. It the first time a manager at the company

had shown concern for our injuries.

LOOKING BACK, WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE DONE

DIFFERENTLY

?

Of course, if I had known about carpal tunnel syndrome, I would not

have conducted so many experiments on myself. But I would not have

changed anything else I did. I felt a duty towards not injuring patients

using our device. That’s why I kept complaining. I didn’t know it then, but

I am glad that doctors vow to “first, do no harm.” Without the insistence of

the anesthesiologist on the Board of Directors, the wrist brace design

would not have been changed until a patient in the operating room was

severely injured.

W

HAT ARE YOU DOING NOW?

I left the startup less than a year later, when I got a new job at another

device company. Believe it or not, this was only one of many incidents that

happened to me at this startup and caused me to leave.

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