To date, the duo has more than 400 patents for medical diagnostic devices and has generated more than $1 billion in sales. Other notable inventions include the Quantitative Buffy Coat analysis test for malaria and the HemaWipe test for colon cancer screening. "All the diagnostics and all the inventions that we've made were [developed] because we saw a need that wasn't being met," Dr. Levine said.
He said that, early in his career, he struggled to balance his clinical private practice with his teaching obligations at Yale and the pursuit of inventing medical devices. "In order to be a successful inventor, the inventions have to become an obsession," said Dr. Levine, who is married and has three grown children. "In order to be a successful husband and father, you must never let the inventions become an obsession. You must balance and make sure you spend the appropriate quality time with your children. You have to operate at the interface of those two. Occasionally, I would spend too much time on my invention."
The balancing act was difficult, he added, "because I loved everything I was doing, but there's only a finite amount of time."
He retired from clinical practice in 2004 but still mentors medical students and internal medicine residents at Yale. "I have no unmet goals other than to continue doing what I'm doing," he said. "I love it."
All in the Family
Dr. Dan Osterweil calls himself the idea man behind inventions intended to help fall-prone elderly, but he leaves the technical work to his brother, Joseph, who is a retired engineer.
"I create the challenge and the problem and bring the clinical background," said Dr. Osterweil, professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, who also codirects the university's multicampus program in geriatrics and gerontology. His brother "comes up with the electronic solution and then we test it."
Their first project came in 1987 when the brothers created a restraint-free monitoring device that alerts nurses and other caregivers when a patient is leaving a bed, wheelchair, or room. At the time, Dr. Osterweil was medical director of the Los Angeles Jewish Home for the Aging, and he saw the need for a product that would "bridge the gap between inability to provide the right supervision [of patients] and … the potential for falls."
Today, the device, currently known as the TABS mobility monitor, is widely used in long-term care facilities. Though he holds four other patents, Dr. Osterweil said that he's most proud of the TABS mobility monitor "because it was ahead of its time," he said. "The feeling of pioneering something gives me satisfaction."
He and his brother recently patented a system that assesses the wound healing process. "The methodology uses visual imaging and can provide to even nontrained individuals information on size, depth, color, and characteristics," he said.
Given his busy clinical and teaching schedule and his responsibility as editor in chief of the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, Dr. Osterweil devotes only about 5% of a given work week to invention-related matters. But he's focused with that short window of time.
"The key is to be organized, to compartmentalize your activities, be a delegator on one hand and a sharer on the other hand," he said. "If somebody's obsessive-compulsive and wants to do everything himself, and doesn't trust people around him, that's the person who will have a miserable life." But, he said, for the person who "feels good about himself and surrounds himself with people who are talented or better than him, and he knows when to delegate, then life is enjoyable."
Dr. Robert A. Levine (left) and Dr. Stephen C. Wardlaw have received more than 400 patents for medical diagnostic devices. Courtesy Dr. Robert A. Levine
Edison Was Right: Inspiration Is Just the Beginning
So, you think you have a great idea for a medical invention or device? Experts shared the following advice:
▸ Find a mentor. Innovation and invention are "really a mentoring process," said Dr. Fogarty. "It's difficult to teach in a classroom. Find a mentor and spend a fair amount of time with that mentor."
▸ Form partnerships. "Always align or create partnerships with people who have deeper expertise in a component of your invention that you may not have," said Dr. Osterweil. "You may have the great idea but you may not know how to take it to the next step.
▸ Don't give up your medical practice abruptly. Inventing "is best done with a full stomach, which means you should not give up your medical practice," said Dr. Levine. "All my inventions were funded with my own money. I saved my money, lived modestly, and invested in myself."