Technology

How Kenyan’s 3D printing venture changed surgery

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Micrive Infinite founder Chris Muraguri (left) with Prof Dr Symon Guthua, the chief consultant, oral and maxillofacial surgery at the University of Nairobi. Both are working on reducing the cost and risk of surgery using 3D printing at the Nairobi Hospital. Mr Muraguri came up with the innovation while recovering from a fracture. FILE PHOTO | NMG

As rugby-player Chris Muraguri wore his number 7 jersey while he recuperated at his one-roomed house in Nairobi, nursing a right foot double fracture, he surfed the internet looking for ways to speed up his healing. He was hoping to return to the rugby pitch as well as to his pharmacy class at the University of Nairobi.

He came across 3D printing technology and made a skeletal prototype of his injured foot that he shared with his doctor, Prof Symon Guthua, a surgery consultant at the University of Nairobi.

“Professor Guthua wondered how I did it and suggested I meet several of his colleagues for further discussions, saying this served as a navigational tool for my future visits. The prototype helped him understand a patient’s medical problem before surgery can be done.

“It is a compass for surgeons planning for accurate execution of surgeries that can help patients heal faster as well as ease costs,” he told Business Daily. Although he started with only an idea, he has grown his business, which so far grossed Sh25 million.

In 2017, Mr Muraguri abandoned his studies to pursue his new-found business, Micrive Infinite, which he co-founded with Mandela Kiberiti, a sixth year pediatrics student at the University of Nairobi.

“I do not meet patients but have access to their x-rays and extensive discussions helps me understand the extent of the fracture or tumour from which I make a prototype for the doctors to study before heading to the surgery room,” he says.

Mr Muraguri’s business now has four employees handling various tasks, from sourcing for business to making of the prototype that Mr Muraguri then delivers to surgeons.

“I remember making a presentation before a sitting of dental surgeons and their students where one lecturer paid me Sh12,000 for a prototype on a cracked jaw which I did to his satisfaction,” he recalls.

Saying last year he made Sh10 million, Mr Muraguri says access to patient-specific anatomically 3D printed models could reduce costs of surgery in Kenyan public and private hospitals, with surgeons using less time on a single case.

“Not all hospitals have high-end medical equipment for telemedical operations and that is where patient-specific anatomically 3D printed models would benefit ‘poor’ patients.

“It means we would do fewer surgeries if doctors got firsthand access to 3D prototypes indicating their patient’s ailment. Now we open up a patient to determine the next course of action,” he said.

Speaking at a symposium on the importance of 3D Printing in healthcare hosted by Aga Khan University (AKU) and Hospital (AKUH) last year, Mr Muraguri called for public-private partnerships to defray costs of making prototypes for various patients.

“We at times make free prototypes for patients that cannot afford costs of making a prototype. We made one for a girl who suffered a gunshot wound on her face in Yemen that doctors used to remodel her face,” he recalls.

They handle cases from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Nigeria and Yemen and their fees vary depending on the individual cases.

To safeguard the identity of patients and their information, the firm receives numbered x-rays without names and Mr Muraguri never meets the patients; only the surgeons.

In his daily schedule of meetings, Mr Muraguri consults with orthopedic, maxillofacial, plastic and neuro-surgeons.

Use of patient-specific anatomically 3D printed models is a growing global phenomenon that is fast gaining acceptance with the developed world making it a mandatory tool for every surgery.

According to an article carried in Chicago Business magazine, adoption of 3-D printing is happening fastest in the medical industry.

Regulatory hurdles

It cites companies such as Beltone, a Glenview-based hearing-aid maker, as using 3-D printing to make the majority of its hearing aids, and Kalamazoo, Michigan-based Stryker Corp. uses it to produce knee implants.

"With the Midwest's cluster of research institutions and manufacturing expertise, this region is emerging as fertile ground for developing clinical uses for 3-D printing.

“There are still significant regulatory hurdles to the widespread use of 3-D implants and prosthetics, though. So the technology's most immediate impact is on personalised surgery and pre-surgical planning," noted the article.

The article adds that the ability to create a 3-D print directly from CT scans and MRIs allows insight into a patient's anatomy before even setting scalpel to skin.