Northwell hosting open vote for winning innovation

Northwell Health is holding an open vote to decide which of three innovations will receive $100,000 in research funding.

The hospital formerly known as NorthShore-Long Island Jewish Health System also operates Northwell Ventures, which develops and finances spin-off companies based on ideas originating with Northwell physicians, researchers and other employees.

The vote is available at www.northwell.edu/vote and will be open until April 18.

The first innovation is an alternative to patient identification wristbands. That has been the only reliable method of identifying patients in a healthcare setting for more than 50 years, so Peter Constantino, MD, executive director of Northwell's Head and Neck Surgery Service Line and chair of otolaryngology at Lenox Hill Hospital, devised the Patient Identification Shield. It's a temporary stamp that's non-transferable, easily removable, and a more cost-effective alternative to the traditional wristbands.

Second is a tool designed to manage the risk of bleeding in surgery. Fifty million inpatient surgeries are performed each year in the U.S., according to a statement from Northwell, and while technologies like anesthesia and antibiotics can manage pain and infection, managing bleeding can be more challenging. Researchers at Northwell's Feinstein Institute for Medical Research have developed a blood loss manager, which stimulates the vagus nerve through the skin to reduce the amount of blood lost and the time a wound bleeds by 50 percent.

Feinstein Institute researchers developed the third innovation by modifying an existing 3D printer to create a bioprinter, a device engineered to produce living, functional tissue replacement. With the potential to replace many different parts of the human body, custom tissue replacement can be printed using a patient's own cells. Northwell researchers are already working with clinicians across the health system using 3D bioprinting to develop alternatives to traditional medical treatments, including researching ways to create living tissue made of bone or cartilage.