3D data processing is pioneering customised medicine for people with serious bone injuries.

A customised bone plate was implanted into a patient after a collaboration between ANU, Canberra Hospital and the M3D ARC training centre, helping to heal a decades-old injury to the patient’s thigh bone.

Associate Professor Mohammad Saadatfar said the team’s skills in 3D data visualisation and processing enabled a revolutionary solution.

“It can take up to a year to get a customised plate, and cost tens of thousands of dollars, but our process was cheap and took only about 10 days,” said Associate Professor Saadatfar.

The group have started a company and aim to streamline the process and halve the production time.

“We are physicists, we do pretty abstract things. Knowing that some of those things can make a real difference for people in need feels pretty good,” Associate Professor Saadatfar said.