Israel's expertise in electronics, combined with a penchant for innovation
and a strong tradition of medical practice, has proven a lucrative
prescription for healthcare manufacturers. In 1996, exports of Israeli
medical electronics equipment climbed 20 percent to $520 million.
by Simon Griver
According to Mira Richman, director of the Israel Export Institute's
Electronics and Healthcare Products Department, the country's medical
electronics manufacturers use innovative techniques to offer
cost-effective products.
"Equipment that would cost, for example, $250,000 from a Western European
or North American manufacturer," she says, "can be bought in Israel for
just $80,000 and is just as effective. Israeli producers develop new
generations of appliances quickly, and bring them to market within a short
time."
Israel's 235 healthcare exporters range from large, veteran manufacturers
to aspiring start-ups hoping to emulate the accomplishments of established
local companies.
Figures supplied by the Office of the Chief Scientist (OCS) of the
Ministry of Industry and Trade show that 35 percent of the start-ups which
requested OCS assistance last year were companies whose products were
based on medical electronics technology. In addition, some 10 percent of
the projects in the country's technological incubators in 1996 involved
the development of medical equipment.
Medical equipment produced in Israel includes nuclear medical imaging,
computerized tomography, magnetic resonance and ultrasound products.
Recently, a unique, multislice tomography scanner has also been
introduced.
Surgical lasers designed for the fields of aesthetic surgery, plastic
surgery and dermatology, gynecology, urology, neuro-surgery and
gastroentrology were pioneered in Israel in the 1970s. In the future,
lasers are also expected to be used for the treatment of snoring, facial
wrinkles and hair transplants.
Ms. Richman stresses that Israel's strength in this sector emanates from
the strong cooperation between university researchers, hospitals and
industry. The fact that Israel has a strong national infrastructure in
leading-edge electronics and the highest number of physicians per capita
in the world makes a fertile basis for a rapidly growing medical
electronics sector.
Promising ideas of start-ups include disposable, sterile medical devices
for operating rooms and intensive care units, including chest and closed
wound drainage systems and an innovative thermal imaging system for
intra-operative vascular angiography in the cardiac operating room. The
system creates the thermal image of the heart's blood vessels to show the
blood flow in the re-opened coronary arteries. Similarly, imaging systems
for the early detection of breast cancer, through measuring bioelectric
currents to produce real-time images of the electrical impedance
properties of the breast have also been developed.
Many of these fledgling, leading-edge endeavors, and the proliferation of
start-ups developing medical electronic devices, will not only make
Israel's balance of payments healthier, but should also benefit medical
standards worldwide.