Old, Brutal Surgeries Inspire Elegant Modern Devices

April 1, 2009

By combing through old scientific journals, medical-device companies are finding effective, but brutal treatments for common diseases that could be transformed by modern technology into safer, noninvasive procedures. Pairing a century’s worth of surgical history of glaucoma treatment with recent advances in materials design, a California company called The Foundry developed a highly engineered device that can drain fluid out of the eye just like a nasty early-20th-century procedure that involved cutting a hole in the eye. (Wired)