A multidisciplinary course to implement bioengineering design projects for persons with disabilities

There is a growing need to educate future engineers in the multidisciplinary aspects of bioengineering systems design that go beyond the traditional senior design experience. Faculty in Engineering, Education, and Psychology at the University of Denver (DU), collaborated with faculty at the Denver Health Medical Center and received a grant from the National Science Foundation to address this need and develop projects that would aid persons with disabilities. Our approach is to educate the students in an elective course called Bioengineering System Design in the first quarter of the senior year to develop interview skills, interact with medical professionals, identify potential customers, and develop initial design requirements. Our course is then followed by the required senior design sequence in the second and third quarter. The lessons we learned while creating and delivering this course will be described in this paper.