Healthy Medical 3D Printing Market

Materialise has listed its cardiovascular modeling solution as a Class 1 medical device. The market for medical 3D printing is expected to grow 15% annual through 2019. Image: Materialise

The market for 3D printers in the medical industry will continue to expand. According to research from Transparency Market Research, the medical 3D printing market was $354.5 million in 2012, but will grow at a CAGR of 15.4% to reach $965.5 million in 2019.

The 3D Printing in Medical Applications Market report covers implants, surgical guides, surgical instruments, and bio-engineered products. 3D printing is used in fabricating dental, orthopedic, and cranio-maxillofacial surgical guides and implants, as well as self-sterilizing surgical equipment.

North America currently has the largest share of the medical 3D printing market, but between 2013 and 2019 Europe is expected to experience the highest growth rate (15%). That growth will be attributed to generous government funding, merger and acquisition activity, and conducive reimbursement policies.

And more medical applications and 3D-print-enabled solutions are emerging. Forbes just reported on an Israeli company that is 3D printing medical marijuana inhalers with integrated WiFi. Earlier this month, Materialise listed its HeartPrint 3D-printed cardiovascular models as a Class 1 medical device in the U.S. The models are used for pre-operative planning. CT scans are used to create cardiovascular models that can then be printed and used to plan delicate surgeries. And just this week, a patient in Australia received a 3D printed heel bone implant.

“Where I think clinically 3D printing will take us, is to the next generation of imaging.  As we’ve seen in the history of medicine, the better and better our imaging, the more precise we are to pre-operatively be able to say what operation we’re going to do,” said David Morales, MD, Chief of Cardiovascular Surgery for the Heart Institute at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

Source: Transparency Market Research