David Perry
It was a cousinâs lacrosse injury that inspired Alyssa Mulry to dream up ConnectKnee, a brace that tracks a patientâs recovery time. Mulryâs cousin dislocated her patella during a soccer game, requiring long recovery. Then a friend and family members also suffered knee injuries.
âI saw first-hand how limited and discouraging recovery for a knee injury was,â says Mulry, a senior biomedical engineering major from Rutland, Massachusetts. âOne thing stayed the same: a slow and often discouraging recovery. Then the idea really just took off after that.âÂ
ConnectKnee topped a field of 17 entries in the seventh-annual DifferenceMaker Francis College of Engineering Prototyping Competition. The top three teams, and a crowd favorite, won cash prizes. Overall, five teams were selected from the preliminaries in November to present their pitches to a panel of judges.Â