ICRE News

April 29, 2020

CSTP Trainee’s Team Wins 2nd Place in the Randall Family Big Idea Competition

Clinical Scientist Training Program (CSTP) trainee and 4th year medical student Stephen Canton, along with Dukens LaBaze, MD, an orthopedic surgery resident, won second place in this year’s University of Pittsburgh Innovation Institute’s Randall Family Big Idea Competition. Mr. Canton and Dr. LaBaze teamed up to create Sterile Vision, an augmented reality platform that utilizes computer vision and machine learning to allow hospitals to streamline surgical tool utilization and tray management without sacrificing the quality of patient care.

Having experienced firsthand the inefficiencies in operating room workflow and supply chain processes, Mr. Canton and Dr. LaBaze researched these inefficiencies and embarked on stakeholder discovery. Under the guidance of faculty partner MaCalus V. Hogan, MD, MBA, the team created Sterile Vision and pitched their idea at the Big Idea Competition, where they were awarded $15,000 in seed funding.

Started in 2009 thanks to the generosity of Pitt trustee and alum Robert P. Randall and his family, the Randall Family Big Idea Competition awards $100,000 in total prizes annually to teams of Pitt undergraduate and graduate students who may come from any of the schools and departments across the University. The 2020 competition began on February 14 with an entrepreneurship bootcamp and ended on April 22 after three competitive rounds. Originally starting with 90 teams, the field was narrowed to a final 40 teams of 112 students from nine Pitt schools. In past years, many winners have gone on to participate in national pitch competitions, business incubators, and ultimately launch successful startups.