The Lead in Peds: Episode Eight

Moving Parts: Collaboration and Engineering in Pediatric Orthopaedics

The Lead in Peds: Episode Eight

Moving Parts: Collaboration and Engineering in Pediatric Orthopaedics

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About the Episode

At Children’s National Hospital, doctors and engineers are teaming up to change how kids with bone and muscle conditions are diagnosed and treated. From motion-capture labs to robotic tools and 3D imaging, technology is becoming part of the care team and helping kids heal faster and safer.

Nathan Kuppermann, MD, MPH, executive vice president and chief academic officer, talks to Matthew Oetgen, MD, MBA, chief of Orthopaedic Surgery and Sports Medicine, and Kevin Cleary, PhD, associate director of engineering at the Sheikh Zayed Institute for Pediatric Surgical Innovation (SZI), about how technology and teamwork are transforming pediatric orthopaedics.

Children’s National leads the way
Children’s National is unique because doctors and engineers work side by side in the same hospital, allowing them to solve problems together in real time. As Dr. Oetgen explained in Episode 8 of the Lead in Peds podcast, this setup “has been unbelievably facilitating to what we do.”

The SZI allows experts like Dr. Cleary to create and test new technologies right where patients are treated. “Our engineers get to see surgery and the doctors get to see our technology,” Dr. Cleary said. This close teamwork helps ideas move from design to patient care faster than ever before.

Moving the field forward
Children’s National is using robotics, AI and advanced imaging to make medicine safer and more precise. Dr. Oetgen shared that new 3D X-ray machines use “a hundred times less radiation,” protecting kids while giving doctors better views of bones and joints. Dr. Cleary added that their goal is to make care “more quantitative and consistent” by using tools like ultrasound and motion tracking. Together, they’re finding ways to make high-tech treatments more affordable and available to hospitals everywhere.

With their shared vision, Drs. Cleary and Oetgen show how collaboration and creativity at Children’s National are raising the bar for pediatric orthopaedic care.

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