Electronics Equipments
Miniaturization • Reliability (reliability is essential for implantable electronics, but also for external devices where accuracy is critical in diagnosing a patient's condition) • Biocompatibility and non-toxicity • Resistance to sterilization (parts should be able to be sterilized, often more than once, without degrading electrical or physical performance).
Medical electronics is one segment of the commercial market that requires long-term reliability, along with dense circuitry. Also, irregularly shaped substrates may be needed to fit the package.
Medical hybrids must pass even more stringent tests than military hybrids and must be free of contaminants in order to be implanted in humans.
The broad field of medical electronics includes instrumentation for life support, patient monitoring, hearing aids, and pacemakers. The pacemaker market especially has developed rapidly, and hybrid circuits along with it as the logical approach for packaging. As stated above, the restrictions in size and materials have made medical electronics a very challenging area for the hybrid engineer.
