Costa Rica is increasingly valuable to health technology manufacturers working on a global scale, with medical devices touted as the country’s top export since 2017. Recognizing this, the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI) joined forces with the Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency (CINDE) to bring AAMI education to the country’s professional training and device manufacturing campuses.
“As an international organization, AAMI is constantly looking to where quality manufacturing is happening in the world,” said Brad Schoener, vice president of innovation at AAMI. “We’ve recognized that many of our members have a footprint in Costa Rica, and naturally, we’d like to deliver the support they have requested.”
AAMI currently offers more than 18 courses in quality and regulatory assurance, human factors, software and cybersecurity, and sterilization. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) participates in the development of course content and the Association’s 48 instructors lead these courses either in person or through live, virtual training. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, all AAMI instruction will remain virtual-only through 2020.
“AAMI’s reputation for quality and thought leadership allows us to recruit the best instructors, and we have a thorough training process for developing new faculty,” explained Schoener.
“Twelve of the 30 top MedTech companies operate in Costa Rica in 14 different subsectors. Eight of these are some of the top 20 exporters, representing $3.7 million in 2019’s medical devices exports,” added Vanessa Gibson, head of climate investment at CINDE.
“AAMI’s courses will strengthen the knowledge of these companies to continue carrying out high value-added processes to Costa Rica and the world,” she said.
Costa Rica is also the second-largest medical devices exporter in Latin America. Now, through CINDE, AAMI will be providing the education and professional training in standards utilization and product development necessary for manufacturing companies to bring new technologies and devices to market. The first course will start next September.