Your medical device product development team has been designing the latest product and you’ve been reminded that you need to hold a design review. “It’s required by medical device design controls,” one of your colleagues points out. You sigh and start planning to hold the design review.
Both FDA 21 CFR 820 and ISO 13485 require design reviews. While the language in the guidance documents implies technically based reviews, the FDA in particular, has been auditing for project level reviews which include a large cross-functional review group. These meetings can result in a huge delay to the project. There is considerable time spent on scheduling meetings and creating a massive presentation that doesn’t necessarily add value to the product. In addition, getting signatures from all the different individuals can lead to more delays. While you need these types of reviews periodically, they don’t always address the design elements.
Design reviews are actually part of good engineering design practices. When you’ve created the requirements and started designing the product, the design review provides feedback on whether you are on track or if you have missed the intent of the requirements.
I have seen technically based design reviews function effectively in medical device software development. What do they do differently?
You might say hardware doesn’t have the same level of flexibility as software, so you can’t keep the design review small. We typically find that companies implement design reviews for hardware based on large reviews because they haven’t built flexibility into their process.
The following are some ways to make your design review process more effective:
Given the hassle of putting a system level design review together, no wonder teams consider them a project checklist, rather than as a tool for improving the product. Make your process flexible enough to cover the different types of design reviews needed during product development rather than an afterthought.
Strategy 2 Market helps companies increase growth and decrease product development complexity. www.strategy2market.com
For more information or to speak with one of our consultants, please contact Mary Drotar at 312-212-3144 or [email protected]