Healthcare engineering. In its succinct definition, healthcare engineering is "engineering involved in all aspects of healthcare". The term engineering in this definition covers all engineering disciplines such as biomedical, chemical, civil, computer, electrical, environmental, hospital architecture, industrial, information, materials, mechanical, software, and systems engineering.

Based on the definition of healthcare, a more elaborated definition is: "Healthcare engineering is engineering involved in all aspects of the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and management of illness, as well as the preservation and improvement of physical and mental health and well-being, through the services offered to humans by the medical and allied health professions".

Overview

Almost all engineering disciplines (e.g., biomedical, chemical, civil, computer, electrical, environmental, industrial, information, materials, mechanical, software, and systems engineering) have made significant contributions and brought about advances in healthcare. Contributions have also been made by healthcare professionals (e.g., physicians, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, allied health professionals, and health scientists) who are engaged in supporting, improving, and/or advancing healthcare through engineering approaches. 

Healthcare engineering is expected to play a role of growing importance as healthcare continues to be one of the world's largest and fastest-growing industries where engineering is a major factor of advancement through creating, developing, and implementing cutting-edge devices, systems, and procedures attributed to breakthroughs in electronics, information technology, miniaturization, material science, optics, and other fields, to address challenges associated with issues such as the continued rise in healthcare costs, the quality and safety of healthcare, care of the aging population, management of common diseases, the impact of high technology, increasing demands for regulatory compliance, risk management, and reducing litigation risk.  As the demand for engineers continues to increase in healthcare, healthcare engineering will be recognized as the most important profession where engineers make major contributions directly benefiting human health.

History

The American Society of Healthcare Engineering (ASHE), established in 1962, was one of the first to publicize the term healthcare engineering. ASHE, as well as its many local affiliate societies, is devoted to the health care physical environment, including design, building, maintenance, and operation of hospitals and other health care facilities, which represents only one sector of engineers' activities in healthcare.  The term healthcare engineers first appeared in the scientific literature in 1989, where the critical role of engineers in the healthcare delivery system was discussed. A number of academic programs have adopted the name healthcare engineering (e.g., Indiana University, Northwestern University, Purdue University, Texas Tech University, University of Illinois, University of Michigan, University of North Carolina, University of Southern California, University of Toronto), although the description or definition of the term by these programs varies, as each institution has designed its program based on its own distinctive interest, strength, and focus.  The first scholarly journal dedicated to healthcare engineering, Journal of Healthcare Engineering, was launched in 2010 by Dr. Ming-Chien Chyu, focusing on engineering involved in all aspects of healthcare delivery processes and systems.  In the meantime, a number of companies with various foci have adopted healthcare engineering in their names.

Healthcare engineering was first defined in a white paper published in 2015 by Chyu and 40 co-authors who are active members of and contributors to the healthcare engineering community around the world. The white paper was reviewed by more than 280 reviewers, including members of US National Academy of Engineering, engineering deans of the world's top universities, administrators and faculty members of healthcare engineering academic programs, leaders of healthcare/medical and engineering professional societies and associations, leaders of healthcare industry and government, and healthcare engineering professionals from around the world.  This white paper documents a clear, rigorous definition of healthcare engineering as an academic discipline, an area of research, a field of specialty, and a profession, and is expected to raise the status and visibility of the field, help students choose healthcare engineering-related fields as majors, help engineers and healthcare professionals choose healthcare engineering as a profession, define healthcare engineering as a specialty area for the research community, funding agencies, and conference or event organizers, help job-search databases properly categorize healthcare engineering jobs, help healthcare employers recruit from the right pool of expertise, bring academic administrators' attention to healthcare engineering in considering new program initiations, help governments and institutions of different levels put healthcare engineering into perspective for policy making, budgeting, and other purposes, and help publishers and librarians categorize literature related to healthcare engineering. Based on this white paper, a global, non-profit professional organization, Healthcare Engineering Alliance Society (HEALS), was founded by Chyu in 2015, which focuses on improving and advancing all aspects of healthcare through engineering approaches. The white paper has been cited in numerous scientific papers.

Purpose

The purpose of healthcare engineering is to improve human health and well-being through engineering approaches.

Scope

Healthcare engineering covers the following two major fields:
Engineering for healthcare intervention: engineering involved in the development or provision of any treatment, preventive care, or test that a person could take or undergo to improve health or to help with a particular health problem.
Engineering for healthcare systems: engineering involved in the complete network of organizations, agencies, facilities, information systems, management systems, financing mechanisms, logistics, and all trained personnel engaged in delivering healthcare within a geographical area.

Healthcare engineering subjects 
Updated ramifications and lists of topics within individual subjects are available from authoritative sources such as the leading societies/associations of individual subjects and government organizations.

(I) Engineering for healthcare intervention

Fundamentals
 Biomechanics
 Biomaterials
 Biomedical instruments
 Medical devices
 Engineering for surgery
 Medical imaging
 Organ transplantation
 Artificial organs
 Drug delivery
 Genetic engineering
 Engineering for diagnosis/detection
 Health informatics, information engineering and decision support
 Disinfection engineering
Engineering for disease prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and management
 Cardiovascular disease
 Cancer
 Alzheimer's disease
 Diabetes
 Respiratory disease
 Obesity
 Degenerative diseases
 Others
Engineering for patient care
 Patient safety
 Critical care
 Neonatal care
 Home healthcare
 Elderly care
 Patient monitoring
 Health disparities
 Disaster management
Engineering for medical specialties
 Allergy and immunology
 Anesthesiology
 Cardiology
 Critical care medicine
 Emergency medicine
 Endocrinology
 Gastroenterology
 General surgery
 Geriatrics
 Infectious disease
 Neurology
 Neurosurgery
 Nuclear medicine
 Occupational medicine
 Oncology
 Ophthalmology
 Orthopedics
 Pathology
 Pediatrics
 Physical medicine and rehabilitation
 Plastic, reconstructive and aesthetic surgery
 Public health
 Pulmonology
 Radiology
 Radiotherapy
 Rheumatology
 Sports medicine
 Urology
 Vascular medicine
 Others
Engineering for dental specialties
 Endodontics
 Oral and maxillofacial pathology, radiology, and surgery
 Orthodontics and dentofacial orthopedics
 Periodontics
 Prosthodontics
 Others
Engineering for allied health specialties
 Audiology
 Clinical laboratory science
 Environmental health
 Occupational therapy
 Orthotics and prosthetics
 Physical therapy
 Rehabilitation
 Respiratory therapy
 Speech therapy
 Others
Engineering for nursing – including nursing in all related areas

Engineering for pharmacy
 Pharmaceutical design and development
 Bio-/pharmaceutical manufacturing
 Pharmaceutical devices
 Pharmaceutical testing
 Pharmaceutical information systems
 Clinical science
 Regulatory compliance

(II) Engineering for healthcare systems

Healthcare system management, improvement and reform
 Quality, cost, efficiency, effectiveness
 Operations research and systems engineering
 Lean, Six Sigma, total quality management
 Human factors
 High reliability organization
 Resilience engineering
 Rural health
Healthcare information systems
 Electronic health record
 eHealth
 mHealth
 Telemedicine
 Wireless technology
 Data mining and big data
 Information security
Healthcare facilities
 Healthcare infrastructure
 Healthcare energy systems
 Healthcare sustainability and green design
 Environmental health and safety
Healthcare policy

(III) Others

Healthcare engineering education and training
 Collegiate education
 Continued education
Future of healthcare

Synergy

Healthcare engineering features a synergy among the healthcare and medical sectors of all engineering disciplines and the engineering and technology sectors of the health sciences, as depicted in Figure 1.

Professional

Healthcare engineering professionals are mainly (a) engineers from all engineering disciplines such as biomedical, chemical, civil, computer, electrical, environmental, industrial, information, materials, mechanical, software, and systems engineering, and (b) healthcare professionals such as physicians, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, allied health professionals, and health scientists, who are engaged in supporting, improving, and/or advancing any aspect of healthcare through engineering approaches, in accordance with the above definition of healthcare engineering.  Since some healthcare professionals engaged in healthcare engineering may not be considered to be "engineers", "healthcare engineering professional" is a more appropriate term than "Healthcare Engineer".

Venue

Healthcare engineering professionals generally perform their jobs in, with, or for the healthcare industry. Major sectors and subsectors of healthcare industry along with healthcare engineering professionals' contributions are summarized in Table 2.

Education and training

Engineers from almost all engineering disciplines (such as biomedical, chemical, civil, computer, electrical, environmental, industrial, information, materials, mechanical, software, and systems engineering) are always in demand in healthcare. It is a common misconception that only engineers with a background in biomedical engineering, clinical engineering, or related areas may work in healthcare.  However, there is a need for courses and certificate type of programs that prepare non-biomedical engineering students and practicing engineers for service in healthcare.  On the other hand, healthcare professionals (physicians, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, allied health professionals, etc.) may benefit from training to apply engineering to their practice, problem solving, and advancing healthcare.  Due to the rapid advance of technology, continuing education plays a crucial role in ensuring healthcare engineering professionals' continued competence.

See also 

 Health systems engineering
 Health systems science

References

Health care
Engineering disciplines
Health care occupations