Dr. Jennifer Dietrich, chief of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, and Dr. Julie Hakim, Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology fellow, have been awarded $50,000 recently by the National Capital Consortium for Pediatric Device Innovation (NCC-PDI) for their work on customizable 3-D printed pediatric vaginal stents and vaginal dilators. The stents and dilators are designed for girls born with congenital vaginal abnormalities.
This is the third year the NCC-PDI has held a competition to recognize and fund new and innovative pediatric devices. In addition to receiving the funding, the NCC-PDI will share its expertise in design development and help bring the funded products to market. From the 37 applications this year, six were chosen for funding.
“Because of the need for dilators or vaginal stents determined by women born with congenital anomalies of the reproductive tract and by women who have undergone surgery or radiation for gynecologic cancers, we know there is a market for customized devices such as these,” Dietrich said.
“It has been an incredible learning process during my fellowship to move from seeing a need among our pediatric patients undergoing vaginal surgery, to IRB and IACUC approval, to prototyping and now to company formation and product development. We are looking forward to our products providing better outcomes for our patients,” said Dr. Hakim.
NCC-PDI was formed in September 2013 through the FDA’s Pediatric Device Consortia Grant Program to provide infrastructure support and expert consultation on pediatric medical device development throughout the product development lifecycle.