It’s not often that I do book reviews. However, a book crossed my desk that has some extra appeal. Written by Mike Silverman, the book is called “How Reliable is Your Product?” The reason this book caught my attention was the familiar name associated with it. I’m involved in the MD&M East event (June 6-9 in New York City) and one of the classes I’ve penciled into my calendar is called Medical Device Reliability Testing, presented by none other than Mike Silverman.

Back to the book: a lot of the space at MD+DI is spent on reliability issues. If you’re not really careful throughout the entire design process (emphasis on “entire”), the results can be disastrous. Staying on track to develop a reliable product needn’t be a process that completely derails your design either. The book takes the reader through 50 steps that a product designer (design team, management team, etc.) should follow in order to maintain focus with a reliable product.

In Mike’s words, reliability must be part of the design process itself, not something that you keep coming back to periodically. Throughout his 25-year career, Mike has focused on reliability and has seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. Hence, that gives him the needed perspective to guide designers.

If you’ve started on the path toward a new medical device, it might behoove you to invest in this book.

Richard Nass