When was the last time visual effects artists and doctors collaborated to change the world? The video shows our 3D scanning and printing his prosthetic eye, and has been entered in the RANZCO Film Festival held in Wellington.
Gabriel collaborated with Dr Hong Sheng Chiong, founder of OphthalmicDocs, a charity and social enterprise focusing on creating affordable tools and diagnostic device. Dr Hong has developed a 3D printed device (less than $100 NZD) that latches onto doctors’ iPhones for eye exams with as much detail and accuracy as traditional $45,000 machines. These devices have been released to the public, open-sourced, with more than 5,000 downloaded in 2 months from all over the world, particularly in rural areas where expensive machines are hard to come by, afford, and even harder to transport. Medical research is entering an exciting new phase: replicating human organs for surgical planning to save lives. For example, patients with tumors or life-threatening blood vessel disorders such as aneurysms have one shot at corrective surgery. The strategy is:
Take CT/MRI scans.
Clean up unnecessary scanned interferance using 3D sculpting software (such as ZBrush).
3D print the patient’s affected area so surgeons can practice on a to-scale model to ensure the surgery is successful - to develop a physical prosthesis of the eye socket.
Gabriel's work with OphthalmicDocs followed this pipeline – we received the MRI scans, Gabriel worked on the 3D scans and cleaned up the scanned data, and printed multiple prototypes by our physical measurements of patients to ensure a perfect fit. With this new knowledge came an exciting opportunity: we filmed a mini-documentary with Dr. Mimi Chiu about a Gisborne local, Graham, and his story about losing his entire eye to cancer a few years ago. Our video documentary was also submitted to a film festival in Wellington, and was placed as a finalist!
from ideation to prototyping
Gabriel works closely with Dr Hong and Dr Mimi to discuss the workflow in using MRI scans as the primary solution to solve the challenges of producing prosthesis accurately for patients. MRI scans embed highly-detailed 3D data which is the perfect solution to study internal bones and skull traumas. However, the complexity of the detailed scans can interfere and visually block the areas surgeons need to study and examine. Gabriel presented a cost-effective solution using Zbrush to handle the high detailed scans and could clean and erase unnecessary scanned data in real-time. The success of our collaboration between artists and doctors has made headlines in the press. We presented our project to the Gisborne Innovation Hub, and across colleges and schools.
TEDX AUCKLAND PRESENTATION (video)
Dr Hong Sheng Chiong has managed to fight blindness with a $20 invention attached to a smart phone and in the process is changing how we think and create medical equipment. Dr Hong completed his clinical training in Ireland before he crossed over to New Zealand where he initially worked as a registrar in neurosurgery and general surgery before he stepped into the world of eye. His main interests are eye regenerative medicine, bioengineering and telemedicine. His exposure to third world medicine in Kenya, Nepal and Malaysia have given him insight into the burden of preventable blindness. He believes the problem lies in access to quality eye care. In 2014, he founded OphthalmicDocs, an R&D company that focuses on the development of ultra-mobile and economical eye tests and diagnostics devices. He has invented several eye imaging adapters that can be used in conjunction with a mobile application to diagnose and monitor eye diseases. Fighting preventable blindness is his career's primary mission.