Problem
- Healthcare costs consume a staggeringly large fraction of our nation’s economic output and account for 16.5% of U.S. GDP.
- While diagnostic assays comprise less than 5% of hospital costs, such tests influence as much as 60 -70% of all health care delivery.
- Processing large amounts of information cost effectively at the point-of-need is common in electronics, yet we lack similar capacity to efficiently process complex molecular disease signatures.
Solution
Rice University medical microdevice technology has the potential to lead to transformative changes in the practice of medicine through the development of powerful yet affordable diagnostic tools made with manufacturing methods adapted from the electronics industry. Stronger emphasis on early disease detection and wellness using advanced diagnostics can yield huge economic savings and increase quality of life in the US and globally.
Unique Opportunities for Philanthropy
Priority #A: Microfluidics microfabrication collaborative (MIMIC) facility will be used to establish infrastructure for medical microdevice design, fabrication and testing. Facility will service 42 Rice groups and extend into Texas Medical Complex through interactions with the GCC Early Disease Detection Cluster (100+ clinical researchers). Philanthropy will help to maintain Rice/Houston's lead in development of IC of medicine/bio-marker highway and to create hub of a new bio-nano-chip industry in Texas.
Priority #B: Realizing Affordable Healthcare will be used to bring microdevice discoveries from the bench to the bedside.Philanthropy will help to identify the most cost-effective medical microdevices, develop policy recommendations that encourage the adoption of cost saving devices in the marketplace, and train Rice scientists with business skills to bring their discoveries to market.
Priority #C: Disease Specific Seed Programs will be used to nucleate new disease specific efforts so that customized microchips for various diseases can be created for the first time and the initial clinical data acquired. Philanthropy will help to secure proof of principle data and place these diseases on a fast track for large scale Federal funding moving them closer to widespread clinical practice.