Life cycle analysis for patient monitor
Isometsä, Elina (2023)
2023
Materiaalitekniikan DI-ohjelma - Master's Programme in Materials Engineering
Tekniikan ja luonnontieteiden tiedekunta - Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2023-03-20
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202303082838
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202303082838
Tiivistelmä
The medical device industry is growing interest in environmental impacts of medical products. Medical devices, such as patient monitors, hold significant value in treating and diagnosing patients, but sometimes end up emitting the environment with toxic chemicals and compounds used during processing. Especially electrical components that are widely used in medical devices hold toxic but also precious and rare minerals and metals where recovering the material and processing it in safe ways would be extremely important.
The goal of this study was to perform lifecycle analysis (LCA) to a patient monitor and study the environmental impacts of the monitor. Other goal was to understand the importance of patient monitors and why designing environmentally conscious medical devices is challenging. The study also answered questions on how different lifecycle stages contributed to the environmental impacts, where these impacts were coming from and studied ways to reduce the environmental impacts.
What makes designing environmentally conscious medical devices challenging are the many safety and quality standards required for material used in medical devices. Often the requirements to be safe can conflict with the requirements of using sustainable materials. Also, common tools for environmentally conscious design, such as LCA, do not take into consideration the specific requirements of the medical device field and thus they are found to be difficult to use.
The results indicated that the use phase was the most significant in regards of environmental impacts but there were several factors affecting the use phase, such as energy type used, geographical scope and the change of parameters included. Materials and components were other significant lifecycle stage in regards of the environmental impacts and these impacts were coming from the electrical components, especially from circuit boards, power supply unit and LCD technology. The other lifecycle stages that were studied, assembly, upstream transportation, and assembly, had negligible impacts on the total environmental impacts. End-of-life was left out of the scope, but trough literary research, it was concluded that the end-of-life would also have negligible effect on the total environmental impacts.
The main ways to reduce the environmental impacts of the patient monitor would be using only fossil free energy in all lifecycle stages that require energy, but especially in the use and processing stages. Other ways to reduce the environmental impacts would be finding a way to recycle and reuse the materials and components of the patient monitor and recover the precious materials and compounds that are wasted during processing but also during the end of the monitors lifecycle. Also, the logistics during the supply chain should be studied to optimize and minimize the transportations during different stages of processing.
The goal of this study was to perform lifecycle analysis (LCA) to a patient monitor and study the environmental impacts of the monitor. Other goal was to understand the importance of patient monitors and why designing environmentally conscious medical devices is challenging. The study also answered questions on how different lifecycle stages contributed to the environmental impacts, where these impacts were coming from and studied ways to reduce the environmental impacts.
What makes designing environmentally conscious medical devices challenging are the many safety and quality standards required for material used in medical devices. Often the requirements to be safe can conflict with the requirements of using sustainable materials. Also, common tools for environmentally conscious design, such as LCA, do not take into consideration the specific requirements of the medical device field and thus they are found to be difficult to use.
The results indicated that the use phase was the most significant in regards of environmental impacts but there were several factors affecting the use phase, such as energy type used, geographical scope and the change of parameters included. Materials and components were other significant lifecycle stage in regards of the environmental impacts and these impacts were coming from the electrical components, especially from circuit boards, power supply unit and LCD technology. The other lifecycle stages that were studied, assembly, upstream transportation, and assembly, had negligible impacts on the total environmental impacts. End-of-life was left out of the scope, but trough literary research, it was concluded that the end-of-life would also have negligible effect on the total environmental impacts.
The main ways to reduce the environmental impacts of the patient monitor would be using only fossil free energy in all lifecycle stages that require energy, but especially in the use and processing stages. Other ways to reduce the environmental impacts would be finding a way to recycle and reuse the materials and components of the patient monitor and recover the precious materials and compounds that are wasted during processing but also during the end of the monitors lifecycle. Also, the logistics during the supply chain should be studied to optimize and minimize the transportations during different stages of processing.