History of the Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering

ANNELISE ROSENFALCK Department of Medical Informatics and Image Analysis, Aalborg University, Denmark

INTRODUCTION

The first general assembly in the Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering was held on 27th November 1973. It was prepared by a group from universities, industry and engineering societies. They had a common goal, and found it important that the society should be a forum for collaboration between these groups and that the first president should come from medicine.

  The Nordic collaboration in this area has always been large. Two Nordic guides to keypersons and companies in biomedical engineering were published in 1969 and in 1975 [1,2]. British-Danish collaboration was great; a large group (about 50) came to Denmark for a common seminar in 1972 and the sixth Nordic meeting of medical and biological engineering was held in Aberdeen in 1984. The first Nordic meeting on medical and biological engineering was held in Finland in January 1970 (200 participants) and the second Nordic meeting in Oslo in June 1971 with 300 participants and a large commercial exhibition. At this meeting the initiator Øivind Lorentsen saluted with a "Lur", which has been blown at later Nordic meetings. The third meeting was in Finland 1975. The new Danish Society hosted the IV Nordic meeting in 1977. This meeting was held at The Technical University of Denmark with professor Georg Bruun as president (250 participants). Since then the meetings have been held every three years. In 1990 it was held at Aalborg University (150 participants). By now there are often two or three conferences on biomedical engineering each year. It is thus excellent that Finland was able to collect about 400 participants to a conference in Tampere in 1997. The next conference is planned to be held in Estonia in year 2000.

  The International Federation of Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE) held its first international meeting in 1958 and the second in Paris in 1959 [3]. About 6 Danes participated in this meeting, four came from the Institute of Neurophysiology in Copenhagen.

 The other Nordic countries joined the Federation in the late 1960s and Denmark in 1976. However, there were about 10 individual Danish members of the Federation since 1959.

  The Federation published its history in 1997 [4].

THE PRECESSOR OF THE SOCIETY

In the 1960s the Danish Biomedical Engineering Committee (DBMEC) was extremely active. The committee was established in 1966, connected with the Danish Academy of Sciences and supported by the Medical Research Council and the Danish Council for Scientific and Technical Research. The aim was to promote co-operation between the medical, biological and engineering disciplines. The Committee was headed by professor Tybjerg Hansen and had an academic secretary, Lone Dybkjær [5].

  The members of the Danish Biomedical Engineering Committee were elected among the most active groups at universities and hospitals. In 1968 DBMEC established three sub-committees: a contact committee, an education committee and an industrial committee. The members of DBMEC and its subcommittees are listed in Appendix I.

The contact committee arranged meetings, symposia and lectures, established contacts to the Nordic countries and the international world and maintained a database on active persons in the field.

  The meeting activity in the first years was extremely high and excellent meetings with up to 200 participants were held 8-10 times each year. The list of subjects for the meetings in 1969 is quite impressive:

• Biomedicine and intensive care. The meeting was held at Gentofte hospital and it included a commercial exhibition (200 participants)

• Small portable data instruments was held at the Institute of Neurophysiology (100 participants),

• Computers for on-line signal analysis; seminar at RISØ,

• Ultra sound,

• Recent developments in radioisotope scanning and image processing (40 participants),

• Plastic in biomedicine,

• Electro-sleep and electro-anesthesia,

• Thermography (lectures with demonstration of equipment),

• Engineering and biomathematical techniques to facilitate bedside management of the critical ill.

The education committee encouraged biomedical engineering education on the academic as well as the non-academic level. The main result was that The Technical Highschool of Denmark (DTH), later the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) and Aalborg University Center (AUC), later Aalborg University (AAU), increased their activities [A02, A03]. When the education committee began its activity there already existed two formal courses in medical electronics: a half year course at the Technical University for Master students in their last year of the study and a course for Bachelor students at the Technical Engineering School in Copenhagen. The universities had previously held a rather large course in physiology for engineers working in hospitals and medical institutes, a half-year course in mathematics, physics and physical chemistry as well as shorter courses in statistics, programming, biochemistry and chromatography for physicians. In addition some scientific medical societies had arranged 1-2 days’ courses in specific subjects, for instance electrodes.

The industrial committee had 15 active members in 1969 and 22 members in 1970. They discussed themes of mutual interest, attended the seminars and meetings, and contributed financially to DBMEC.

In addition to these three main committees DBMEC organized a patient safety committee. This topic was extremely urgent because mains driven invasive instruments had just been introduced in the study of critical ill patients. Two of the members of DBMEC, Georg Bruun and Christian Guld, collaborated on screening of instrumentation and mains supply. They developed methods for measuring magnetic and electrical interference and developed excellent rules that are still used in hospitals, universities and industry [6].

Since 1940 there has been a tradition in most countries that physicists worked in hospitals in the radiotherapy departments and chemical engineers in the clinical chemistry departments. Around 1960 a few engineers came into biomedical engineering. In 1969, about 12 with a technical education worked at the University Hospital in Copenhagen, only two at Aarhus University but about 20 at the Copenhagen County hospital. Most of the engineers were attached to a single department, but a new idea of collecting the engineers in biomedical departments was on its way. The development is described in [A01].

THE FOUNDATION OF THE DANISH SOCIETY FOR BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

In 1969, the Danish Biomedical Engineering Committee suggested to start a biomedical society and the three subcommittees and active persons in the field received a questionnaire. The majority preferred the existing organization and expressed great admiration for the excellent work done by the chairman of DBMEC, professor Tybjerg Hansen and by Lone Dybkjær. The hesitant attitude was also due to the fact that the active group in Denmark was larger than the societies in the other Nordic countries. In addition a large number (app. 30%) of the active group were physicians, dentists or scientists. Some preferred a society with the aim to join the International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering. At that time only few were individual members of the Federation.

  However, the support from the research councils to DBMEC was not continued after May 1972 and in January 1973 the head of the Danish Academy of Sciences, Bjerre Lavesen, took the initiative for planning a biomedical society. He asked professor Georg Bruun to arrange a meeting in his office at the Electronics Institute at DTU. Lone Dybkjær and Annelise Rosenfalck were asked to participate and this group agreed on the importance of establishing a biomedical society. They were also eager to continue the biomedical activities of the two engineering societies in Denmark (The society for M.Sc. engineers and for B.Sc. engineers), where Sven Erik Jensen, Torben Jørgensen and Peder Holmkjær were very active. They negotiated with their societies and the societies helped to write laws for the biomedical society and promised financial support for the first years. However, in the last negotiations it became clear that the president for the society should be M.Sc. in engineering and that engineers, who were not members of one of the engineering societies could not join the society. The group could not agree on these restrictions and decided to start an independent society.

  The first general assembly of the Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering was held on 27th November 1973. Georg Bruun had asked professor H. Hertz from Lund’s Technical University to speak about: "New methods for image-recording in biology and medicine".

  About 100 participated in the meeting. After a short welcome by Annelise Rosenfalck it was suggested to ask Sven Erik Jensen to be conveyor of the meeting. Annelise Rosenfalck made a short speech, describing the previous history and the future goal for a society. Torben Jørgensen presented the laws and suggested voting on them. However, that was a problem as one of the participants claimed, that the group, who had arranged the meeting, had done it on their own initiative – the society did not exist and thus, had no members who could vote on the laws or elect a board. This came as a surprise, especially since this participant had previously turned down an offer of becoming the first president of the society.

  After several hours of discussion, a preliminary law, which should be valid up to 1st April 1974 was accepted and a non-permanent board elected.

   Professor Erik Skinhøj became the first president.

  It was a very tired professor Hertz from Lund who gave an excellent lecture. Most interesting was his message on the new ink-writer, the Mingograph.

THE AIM OF THE DANISH SOCIETY FOR BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

The aim of the Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering is to promote the scientific and technical development of biomedical engineering.

  To reach this goal the society should make an effort:

1. to create contact between groups of different education and occupation interested in biomedical engineering,

2. to promote mutual education between these groups by arranging meetings, seminars and study-groups,

3. to collaborate with the Scandinavian and international societies in biomedical engineering,

4. to provide information on biomedical engineering.

In the law it is also stated that when electing the board, the goal is to obtain a wide representation from all groups occupied in biomedical engineering. As can be seen from the list of board members over the 25 years (Appendix II) this goal has been reached.

  The first president professor Erik Skinhøj was chief physician in neurophysiology in Copenhagen, professor dr.med. Jørgen Fabricius, chief physician in cardiology in Odense, took over in 1975, Annelise Rosenfalck, electronic engineer and professor of biomedical engineering in Aalborg followed in 1981, professor, dr.med. Ole Siggaard-Andersen, head of the Clinical Chemistry Department at Herlev University Hospital, followed in 1992 and the present president associate professor, dr.med. Hans Stødkilde-Jørgensen, The MR Centre of Aarhus University Hospital, took over in 1995.

  It has been important that members from the industry have been very active. The first secretary of the society was Armand Schlägel; he came from industry (Simonsen and Weel), the second Sven Erik Jensen came from the hospital sector and the third Gert Kokholm come from industry (Radiometer). They have had the main responsibility for the society and all activities have depended on them.

SOME ACTIVITIES OF THE DANISH SOCIETY FOR BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

The main activity has been to arrange 5-6 meetings each year. This has been done pretty much in the same line as done by DBMEC’s contact committee. At all meetings new subjects have been presented from the medical and the technical aspect. In the first years, only few courses were held, but several of the meetings acted as courses and were free of charge. It was attempted to plan meetings in all parts of the country. The meetings usually have taken place at universities and in hospitals. Meetings have generally been well attended (40-100 participants).

  Some of the most successful meetings were arranged by industry. The timing has usually been in December. Industry invites the members to come to their plants. The industry plans the meeting, the speakers are half physicians and half engineers. The clue is a nice meal, where the participants can continue the discussion. These meetings usually have at least 100 participants.

  Many meetings have been planned together with other medical societies, and  WHO’s European headquarter in Copenhagen has several times invited the society to meetings on technology assessment.

  Several times it has been possible to arrange meetings with international speakers, when EEC seminars were held in Denmark. It was always attempted to inform about the EEC projects and to keep members of the society updated.

  Biomedical engineering has been an integral part of the EEC biomedical and health research program since the first concerted actions was initiated in 1978. The physician Steen Dawids was one of the first three project leaders. In the first years the activity was planned by a group of two participants from each of the EEC countries. Steen Dawids and Annelise Rosenfalck were elected by the medical research council to represent Denmark. In the first years about 1 million ECU was spent on three concerted actions mainly for travelling of the 100 teams, who participated in the activity. The BIOMED I program (1990-94) had available 133 million ECU, which supported 362 concerted actions and 41 shared cost projects with a total of 7300 participants. A shared cost project grants money for labor, instrumentation and travel. In the running program BIOMED II 336 million ECU will be awarded. There is only limited information on the number of participants from Denmark but just to mention some examples it can be said that AAU at present participates in at least 4 shared cost projects and that DTU has an even greater activity. Many researchers have also participated in the Advanced Informatics in Medicine program AIM, and in several programs for handicap engineering. It is interesting to notice that Nordic collaboration within research has been increased by EEC collaboration. The Nordic countries in the first years participated in the activities as guests, later they became affiliated members and finally in 1994 as full members and project leaders.

INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION

The society joined the International Federation of Medical and Biological Engineering in 1976.

  The Federation was founded in 1958 and held the first international conference in Paris in 1959 [3]. About 6 Danes participated in this meeting, four came from the Institute of Neurophysiology in Copenhagen. At present a conference is held each third year. The 18th conference was held in Nice in 1997. The other Nordic countries joined the Federation in the late 1960s and Denmark in 1976. However, there were about 10 individual members of the Federation since 1959. At present the Federation has 44 member countries. The history of the international federation was published in 1997 [4].

  The Federation publishes the Journal of Medical Electronics and Biological Engineering, which individual members of the Danish Society can obtain for a very low subscription rate. In recent years they also publish a newsletter, which is distributed to all members.

  The board of the DMTS has attended the meetings of the secretaries and the general assembly at most of the international conferences. Peder Holmkjær has been member of the clinical engineering working group. Annelise Rosenfalck has served on the IFMBE European Working group and several times at the nomination committee. Recently, she was appointed Founding Fellow of the International Academy for Medical and Biological Engineering.

  The Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering sponsored and participated in the arrangement of the IMIA (the International Medical Informatics Association) and the IFMBE Working Conference on "Biosignal Interpretation" in 25th-27th August 1993. It was the first meeting where IMIA and IFMBE arranged a joint meeting on "Biosignal Interpretation". The organizers were professor Jan van Bemmel, The Netherlands, professor Niilo Saranummi, Finland, and Annelise Rosenfalck, Denmark.

  The meeting was held in Rebild Bakker near Aalborg. The main sponsor for the meeting was the Commission of the European Communities-DG XII.

  The main topics were: Detection and parameter estimation, Monitoring and real time interpretation, and Model based biosignal interpretation. The scientific program included 47 papers of which 30 papers were selected to be published in a special issue of Methods of Information in Medicine, January 1994 [9]. The meeting was extraordinary in that most time was left for discussion. The participants (about 70) came from Europe, USA and Japan.

  The usual excursion at the meeting became a surprise for the participants. There was no bus! We were in the midst of nature and walked with guidance in Rebild Bakker.

  The second meeting on biosignal interpretation was held in Japan in 1996.

NORDIC COLLABORATION

The Nordic activities started in 1969 mainly on Finnish initiative. Two Nordic guides were published in 1969 and 1977 [1,2], Fig. 1. Planning meetings have been held regularly. Planning of Scandinavian meetings was the main goal and the first Nordic meeting was held in Helsinki in 1970 under the auspices of IFMBE.

  The Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering has sponsored and arranged two Scandinavian meetings in 1977 in Copenhagen and in 1990 in Aalborg.

The IV Nordic Meeting was held at the Technical University of Denmark, 28th June-2nd July 1977, near Copenhagen. Professor Georg Bruun was president. The 67 papers were presented in two parallel sessions and in poster sessions [7]. The meeting was held in English, Fig. 2.

  The subjects were grouped around nine main themes: The organization of clinical engineering; Symposium on ion sensitive and metal electrodes; Interaction between tissue and implanted materials; Electrodes; Clinical information systems; Technical aids for the handicapped; Transducers, measurements and methods in clinical physiology; Symposium on ultrasound and Signal processing in biomedical engineering. One afternoon excursions to hospitals, scientific institutes and factories were arranged. The City Council of Copenhagen invited the members of the meeting to a reception at the Copenhagen City Hall, where the "Lur" was blown. The meeting was supported by NORDFORSK and from the Danish foundation Thomas B. Thrige’s Fond.

  The 8th Nordic meeting was held at Aalborg University 10th-13th June 1990. Five themes were selected: Diagnosis and care for the cancer patient; Monitoring and care of the critically ill patient; Diagnosis and care of the patient with neurological disorders; Quality and technological assessment in health care; and Knowledge based systems.

  The themes were selected because Danish industry and research are active within these areas. In the mornings invited speakers presented lectures and a few free communications were given. Most free communications were presented in the afternoons as posters, where the invited speakers from the morning sessions conducted the discussions. It was possible to invite speakers because EEC’s biomedical program, Danish funds and Danish industry gave financial support. The advance selection of themes limited the number of participants to 150, but most were active, 102 papers were presented [8].

  Before the conference dinner the municipality of Aalborg had invited the participants to a reception at Aalborg art museum. The "Lur" was blown.

  It has often been attempted to publish a Nordic Journal, which could be distributed among members. The problem has always been whether a high scientific level can be obtained, if the journal is published in a Scandinavian language. Another problem is finances; biomedical industry has often hesitated to buy expensive advertising. Over a span of years we had a Swedish publication Medicinsk Teknik, which was sent to Danish members. The level of the papers decreased, however, considerably. For about two years a high quality journal Medicinsk Teknologi was published in Denmark and distributed free of charge to the medical profession but not to engineers.

  In recent years the contact at the society level is less frequent, however, at the scientific level it has increased due to EEC sponsored projects.

FUTURE OF THE DANISH SOCIETY FOR BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING

At present the Society has 206 individual members (2 live abroad and 5 are honorary members) and 22 industrial members. The meetings are advertised in the weekly medical publication, Ugeskrift for Læger, and in the weekly engineering publication, Ingeniøren. The meetings are open for everybody interested in biomedical engineering. A new trend is to arrange 2 days-courses, with a course fee, because it is at present possible to obtain support for postgraduate education. The first evening is combined with a meeting of the society.

  The society has got a web page: www.ouh.dk/dmts, where information on upcoming meetings, members list, etc., can be retrieved. The last contribution is a discussion group.

  The society wants to interfere in planning of education and to further develop its activities. New goals will be discussed at a seminar 27th November 1998. There will be a paper contest and a seminar with speakers from industry, universities and hospitals.

REFERENCES

APPENDIX I

• Georg Bruun, professor of Electronics, (DTH)

• Christian Guld, biomedical engineer, lecturer, (UNI)

• Peder Holmkjær, chief-engineer, Herlev University Hospital.

• A. Kirkeby, M.Sc., Birch and Krogboe

• Arne Mose-Christensen, director for DEMKO

• Asger Pedersen, dr.med., chief physician, Glostrup Hospital

• Leif Rystrøm, electronic engineer M.Sc., Chr. Rovsing Ltd.

• Erik Sandøe, dr.med., chief physician, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University.

Members of the Industrial Committee of DBMEC 1969:

• The Danish Center for Datahandling

• The Danish Sugar Corporation Ltd. (now Danisco).

• DISA Electronics ( now Dantec)

• N. Foss Electric

• Hellesens

• HETO Hfg, Co.

• Kaiser’s Laboratory Ltd.

• LK. NES, Ltd.

• Oticon Ltd.

• Philips Ltd.

• Chr. Rovsing Ltd.

• Radiometer Ltd.

• Svend Schrøder

• Simonsen and Weel’s successors (now Artema Monitoring and Emergency Care Ltd.)

• Torben Søderberg Ltd.

Reference: Rosenfalck A. The history of the Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering. In: The Danish Society for Biomedical Engineering, ed. Aspects of biomedical engineering in Denmark. Copenhagen, 1998: 7-18.

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