The Mayo Clinic & ASU MedTech Accelerator was an intensive, interdisciplinary internship designed to support early-stage medical technology startups. Unlike traditional engineering roles focused solely on technical development, this experience required collaboration across clinical, business, regulatory, and research domains.

Throughout the program, I worked alongside:

• Physicians and clinical stakeholders

• Biomedical engineers

• Entrepreneurs and startup founders

• Regulatory and commercialization mentors

My responsibilities included:

• Assisting medtech startups in refining business plans

• Conducting product and market landscape analyses

• Supporting go-to-market strategy development

• Researching regulatory pathways and reimbursement considerations

• Participating in structured entrepreneurial curriculum sessions

• Maintaining detailed documentation of mentor feedback and development milestones

This experience exposed me to the full lifecycle of medical device innovation, from ideation and clinical need identification to commercialization and investment strategy.

I learned how to:

• Translate clinical problems into scalable business opportunities

• Evaluate competitive landscapes and market size

• Understand FDA regulatory classifications and approval considerations

• Communicate technical information to non-technical stakeholders

• Assess product-market fit in a healthcare context

The MedTech Accelerator significantly expanded my perspective on what it means to be a biomedical engineer.

Academic Value

This experience reinforced concepts I learned in engineering design courses while adding new dimensions:

• Regulatory strategy

• Intellectual property considerations

• Investor relations

• Customer discovery methodologies

It helped me move beyond “Can we build it?” to also ask:

• “Should we build it?”

• “Who will use it?”

• “How will it reach patients?”

• “Is it financially sustainable?”

Professional Development

The accelerator strengthened my:

• Cross-sector communication skills

• Strategic thinking abilities

• Confidence in professional clinical settings

• Ability to evaluate healthcare technologies from multiple perspectives

It also directly prepared me for my Senior Capstone project by giving me prior exposure to clinician collaboration, needs assessment, and structured product evaluation.

The Health theme emphasizes not only developing innovative technologies, but ensuring they are accessible, scalable, and impactful.

The MedTech Accelerator directly aligned with this theme by focusing on:

• Translating medical innovation into real-world clinical implementation

• Addressing barriers to healthcare commercialization

• Ensuring technologies meet both patient and provider needs

• Evaluating cost, accessibility, and system-level feasibility

Through this experience, I recognized that improving health outcomes requires more than technical excellence. It requires interdisciplinary coordination between engineers, clinicians, entrepreneurs, and regulatory experts.

For example, I observed how a technically strong device could fail if reimbursement pathways were unclear or if the regulatory strategy was misaligned. This systems-level awareness deepened my understanding of healthcare innovation.

The MedTech Accelerator strengthened the multidisciplinary foundation established in FSE150 and connected directly with my other GCSP competencies:

• Talent: I applied needs-based design principles and commercialization awareness when developing E-Lumenate.

• Entrepreneurship: The accelerator reinforced startup strategy, investor communication, and product validation skills.

• Service Learning: I saw firsthand how cost, scalability, and access determine whether innovations truly benefit patients.

• Multicultural: Understanding diverse patient populations and healthcare systems emphasized the importance of inclusive design.

This experience solidified my understanding that advancing the Health Grand Challenge requires collaboration across engineering, medicine, and business. It strengthened my ability to think beyond isolated technical problems and toward integrated healthcare solutions.

The MedTech Accelerator transformed my perspective from being solely a biomedical engineering student to becoming an emerging medical technology innovator capable of navigating the interdisciplinary ecosystem required to improve human health.