Prof Abhay Pandit
Director of Rinn Medical Devices
Rose Anne Kenny
Regius Professor of Physic at Trinity College Dublin and founding Principal Investigator of TILDA
A medical devices centre aims to enter a new innovation phase focused on healthy ageing.
Rinn Medical Devices is one of seven centres forming the Rinn Network, funded through Research Ireland. It builds on the work of CÚRAM, the Research Ireland Centre for Medical Devices that ran from 2015 to 2026.
Medtech solutions for healthy ageing
According to Prof Abhay Pandit, Director of Rinn Medical Devices, the centre’s guiding principle is simple: “Our goal isn’t just a longer life, but more years lived well, mobile and independent in our own homes. Chronic conditions often arrive as we age, and our research tackles the most prevalent conditions associated with cardiovascular and neurological health, as well as cancer and inflammatory conditions.”
Anchored within a dynamic ecosystem of researchers, clinicians, industry partners and innovators, Rinn Medical Devices will traverse the trajectory from discovery-based research to real-world health solutions and drive innovation in medtech to patients worldwide. At every step, patient voices, experiences and priorities shape what they do, ensuring that the devices developed are not just scientifically sound but genuinely meaningful to the people they’re designed to help.
The Rinn combines the significant academic leadership and expertise of scientists, engineers and clinicians from ten national Higher Education Institutes, including three Technological Universities. Every national partner brings its network of industry and international academic collaborators, infrastructure and alternative perspectives, all of which enrich the Rinn.
Rinn Medical Devices will traverse the trajectory from discovery-based research
to real-world health solutions and drive innovation in medtech
Experts developing meaningful devices
Rose Anne Kenny, Regius Professor of Physic at Trinity College Dublin and founding Principal Investigator of TILDA, the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing, is part of the leadership team at Rinn Medical Devices. For almost two decades, Regius Kenny and TILDA have tracked thousands of adults as they age, building one of the world’s richest pictures of how heart, brain, mobility and cognitive health change with age. As Director of the Falls and Syncope Unit and the Mercer’s Institute for Successful Ageing, her clinical work already shapes how falls and cognitive decline are treated.
Multidisciplinary approach to design
“This depth of population-level and clinical insight is exactly what Rinn Medical Devices is designed to harness”, explains Regius Kenny. “Partnering with TILDA enables Rinn Medical Devices to draw on rich, longitudinal data, connecting population science, clinical insight and engineering to transform discoveries about ageing into devices for prevention, diagnosis and monitoring that are grounded in real-world need.”
The Rinn will continue to improve the medtech innovation space in Ireland through multidisciplinary medical device innovation, integration of the patient voice in the research agenda and continued talent recruitment through PhD and postdoctoral training networks.
