The use of plastics in the medical field has been stressed in so many exhibitions and seminars. Each day, we see new medical devices and products launched where plastic has played a key role being the raw material used. There seems to be no limit to what injection moulding is capable of and along with the progress in process engineering, the development of new types of materials has opened up additional fields of application.
Plastics has answered the call of the health care and medical industry. Single-use medical articles are now mass-produced fully automatically and under exceptionally high standard of quality, under 100% quality control. An extremely fast cleanroom-compatible removal gripper was launched by Hekuma GmbH, Eching (Germany), at the end of 2009. What the supplier claims to be the fastest removal system currently available for pipette tips achieves with its linear axis acceleration rates of up to 10 g and travel speeds of up to 1,200 mm/s. Another development is the replacement parts for the human body. Particularly spectacular are “components" for use in the inner organs. For instance, the Moscow-based company Roscardioinvest produces a new generation of tri-leaflet heart valves from a modified polyamide. The mechanical heart valve weighing only 0.25 g proved to be a severe test for its developers. The world’s first mould for the fully automatic, finishing-free injection moulding of such heart valve leaflets has been developed and made by Köbelin Formenbau GmbH, Eichstetten (Germany).
All these and many more are expected to be showcased in the upcoming K 2010 in Germany, where key players will show off their innovations for the benefit of human lives.
