BDC Laboratories
Gateway to Positive Clinical Outcomes

Advances in simulation have opened doors for development and testing of innovative medical devices. Medical device companies recognize the need to equip and train their surgeons with more accurate turnkey products to realize the benefit of the full spectrum of therapy in both healthy and diseased conditions and treatments. Colorado-based Biomedical Device Consultants and Laboratories (BDC Laboratories) offers testing services and equipment with simulation training suites tailored for the medical device industry. Their services aid in the mechanical and functional testing of medical device technologies as they relate to clinical outcomes. “We strive to be on that cutting edge of finding ways to provide better and more clinically relevant solutions,” says Craig Weinberg, Ph.D., CEO of BDC Laboratories.

BDC Laboratories has been serving the cardiovascular implantable device community since the mid-1980s. BDC Laboratories has three divisions that provide functional performance testing, simulation solutions with silicone mock vessels and anatomical models, as well as test equipment that can be used for evaluation. Backed by years of experience in cardiovascular technology, the company addresses some of the main challenges in cardiovascular models relating to arterial components, fluid dynamics, and user experience, by offering solutions around each of them. The uniqueness of the company’s portfolio of products and solutions comes from their experience of designing and building test systems that are electromechanical and computer-controlled.

Medical device companies have used BDC Laboratories’ models for physician training and to move away from animal studies and other methods that are more expensive and challenging to the medical devices community.

A majority of what sets us apart as a true solution provider and an engineering group is we engineer solutions to specifications

In addition to ethical issues that need consideration in animal studies, there are also transportation issues, which typically require doctors to fly to a particular location. BDC Laboratories’ solutions are portable, making it easier to travel with them to different doctor’s offices and remote locations.

The most important value proposition that BDC Laboratories offers is that the company tailors and customizes its platform to each of its customers’ requirements. Weinberg recalls an instance where their client needed assistance in evaluating their next-generation medical technology in coronary stenting. They were using models of simulated calcium that had no resemblance to clinical structure or topography. The models’ manufacturing nature—with very crude parts fitted into a tubular section, made it very difficult to use them in an imaging suite. BDC Laboratories developed a solution to provide the client with a real diseased experience. They embedded calcium and plaque representations with topographies based on clinical guidance, giving the client a more accurate representation of a clinical situation with their technology.

“A majority of what sets us apart as a true solution provider and an engineering group is we engineer solutions to specifications,” states Weinberg. They possess in-house capabilities for manufacturing and designing software and all the different attributes of a project, ranging from very basic simulators to surgical suites. “It’s not good enough to just have a solution, but we want to be able to qualify that solution against a clinical result to truly help our customers meet their needs,” Weinberg adds.

At the end of the day, as technology evolves in the cardiovascular discipline, BDC Laboratories continues to identify lastest trans-catheter and endovascular procedures to provide simulation systems for these nascent technologies. The company’s vision is to continue to expand in the cardiovascular realm with turnkey solutions and platforms that help companies find novel ways of training their physicians and developing innovative technologies.