1.    Introduction

With the leadership and dedication of our executive board members and keen participation of our members, the Biomedical Division (BMD) has gone through a fruitful year of Session 2011/2012.

The global aging trend is noticeable both locally and worldwide, coupled with the ever-increasing standard of quality living and healthcare and the past year has seen persistent growth and development of biomedical engineering. In view of this trend, the BMD has organised and jointly organised a wide scope of activities in collaboration with various stakeholders in the field which included the industry, the academia and the government to:

O   encourage local biomedical engineering research and experimentation;

O   support the local industry in areas of product design, development and commercialisation;

O   conduct technical training, workshops and visits; and

O   inspire and attract more young students to pursue the profession.

The BMD played an important role to serve our society, hospitals, medical centres, medical device industry, academia and all other related stakeholders.

During this Session, the BMD successfully secured the government funding under the Professional Services Development Assistance Scheme (PSDAS) of the Commerce and Economic Development Bureau (CEDB), which is the fifth successful PSDAS approved project of the Division. The theme of this year’s PSDAS project is “To enhance the professional competence of biomedical engineers in medical device safety through the mastering of update knowledge on technology innovation, regulatory affairs and health technology assessment”, and under this theme the BMD will continue to organize relevant activities in the upcoming Session 2012/13. Above all, the successful application for PSDAS funding paves the way for the organization of the upcoming BME2012 Biennial Conference, which is an international event attracting professionals from the international arena in the biomedical engineering field to assemble and cultivate engineering innovations.

A series of CPD seminars were organised in this session which included: Application of Sterilisation Technology in Medical and Healthcare Devices; eHealth Awareness for IT Professionals; Technical Seminar on Medical Technology Management: Practice, Organisation and Education; and COMSOL Multiphysics Application on Biomedical Engineering. The BMD also proactively embarked on membership drive to engineering undergraduates via various promotional events, namely: Career Talk in HKU for Medical Engineering Students; Guest Lecture at CUHK - A Professional Organisation for Biomedical Engineers in Hong Kong; and Alumni Sharing Session Co-Organised with PolyU Alumni Association. In addition, technical visits and certificated training courses were conducted, namely: Two-Day Certificated Practical Training Course on Medical Device Product Registration in China; Study Mission to Beijing on Medical and Healthcare Devices.

I would like to extend my gratitude to the enthusiastic support from the HKIE Headquarters and other Divisions, and particularly for the dedicated collaboration of all our Executive Committee Members and relevant stakeholders. Without their support and professional contribution, the BMD would not have been so successful in organizing these activities during the year. In the upcoming year, the BMD will continue to promote high quality continued professional training to biomedical engineers, to attract young talents to pursue the biomedical engineering profession, to provide excellent services to the clinical institutes, and ultimately to safeguard the benefit and interest of the general public. I have great confidence that the new session, with the incoming chairman, Dr. CHAN Kwok Kwan, and the Committee members, will lead the Division to the next and higher era, with a view to benefiting our biomedical engineering profession, the industry and the community.

Thank you all for your dedication to the Biomedical Division. We look forward to your continued support in the coming session.

Ir Albert POON Ka-fat CCE FHKIE

Chairman, session 2011/12