A Makerspace for Medical Students

MYKE SPENCER WATCHED, on a Wednesday in March, as Cassandra Jones-VanMieghem leaned over a laptop, carefully inspecting his work — a digital rendering of a cervical vertebra. They were looking for imperfections.

If the file passed, it would be sent to a nearby 3D printer, where a coil of white filament would be transformed into something Spencer could hold in his hands. But first, they needed to be sure the model was clean.

“How would you know?” Spencer asked.

“We would see little artifacts floating,” Jones-VanMieghem said. “But it’s only a problem if you want it to be perfect.”

“Well, there are artifacts on them in real life, too,” Spencer replied.

A short time later, Spencer had a finished model. It wasn’t a skill he expected to pick up in medical school. But Spencer, who graduated this spring and matched into the Anesthesia Residency at Indiana University School of Medicine, is now comfortable adapting files and running prints on his own. Jones-VanMieghem, who manages The Makerspace, trusts him to work independently.

The space itself, located on the second floor of the Medical Education and Research Building, is one of IU School of Medicine’s most distinctive learning environments — a place where students and faculty use tools like 3D printers to turn ideas into physical models and prototypes.
The goal isn’t just to produce objects. It’s to give future physicians hands-on experience with technologies shaping medicine.

Spencer discovered that firsthand.

During his first year of medical school, he encountered a problem familiar to many medical students: understanding how human anatomy — vividly illustrated on flat textbook pages — translated into real life. After study sessions, he’d pass The Makerspace’s former home in Ruth Lilly Medical Library and wonder what was inside.

Turns out, its 3D printing tools were the solution to his conundrum. With support from The Makerspace staff, he downloaded a model file and, after a brief tutorial, printed a model of the human pelvis, which he used to understand where muscles anchor to bone. Since then, he’s produced other educational models, such as the interior of the skull, but also projects for relaxation, like a full chess set.

 

A human skull takes shape, layer by layer, on a 3D printer in The Makerspace, one answer to a problem medical students have always faced: anatomy is easier to understand when you can hold it in your hands.

 

“Being able to look at something that’s actually life-size helps you understand where things attach,” Spencer said.

That kind of practical learning sits at the center of The Makerspace.

What began nearly a decade ago as a small 3D printing service inside the medical library has since grown into something broader. The Makerspace now occupies a prominent place in the school’s new building. Its glass-fronted space lines a busy corridor connecting classrooms, study areas and simulation spaces, almost inviting people inside.

The relocation changed student encounters. No longer tucked away in the library, The Makerspace now sits in plain view, where curious students can stop in, much as Spencer once did. In the first six months in the new building, the space logged about 1,500 visitors, more than some entire years at its former location, Jones-VanMieghem said.

“In the library, you had to know we were there,” she added. “Now students walk by and see what we’re doing.”

Today, The Makerspace includes technologies that support both teaching and research. Students create silicone suture pads for surgical practice, use Cricut machines to produce vinyl decals and iron-on designs and occasionally experiment with electronics kits. The equipment varies widely, but the philosophy behind it is consistent: learning happens through making.

Anatomical models remain the most common request. Because students can’t take a cadaver home, many use the printers to produce skulls, pelvises, brains or hearts to study outside the lab. Sometimes, students simply pay staff to produce the model, but often, they opt to join workshops to learn how to do it themselves.

Sessions teach students how to find model files, prepare them and understand how printers turn designs into objects. Removing support material — a delicate, sometimes frustrating step — is also part of the lesson.

Students quickly learn that printing rarely works the first time.

Projects that collapse midway through printing or lose structural integrity often reveal problems in design, scaling or support placement. Rather than hiding those mistakes, staff use them to explain what happened and how to adjust the next attempt.

 

Removing support material is one of the more painstaking steps in the printing process and, Jones-VanMieghem says, one of the more instructive ones.

 

“If you bring something that isn’t perfect, we say, ‘Here are the changes we can make,’” Jones-VanMieghem said. “It isn’t failure. We hope people walk away with knowledge gained for the next time.”

Despite the printers and tools, The Makerspace relies mostly on its people. Jones-VanMieghem and her colleague guide projects, helping students troubleshoot files, refine ideas and understand the equipment. She sometimes jokes that the role feels parental.

“In a weird way, we’re sort of like their moms,” Jones-VanMieghem said. Students and faculty come to the space with half-formed ideas, technical questions or research problems they are trying to solve. Even when staff don’t immediately know the answer, they work alongside users to figure it out.

The projects that come through the door vary widely. Faculty bring practical research challenges, requesting tools that can speed up laboratory work or improve imaging setups. One scientist needed a holder that would allow several mouse femurs to be scanned at once. Another MD-PhD student designed a mount to stabilize a phone against a microscope for photographing slides.

For students, The Makerspace offers hands-on engagement with technology that traditional coursework rarely provides early in medical school. Spencer said learning the printing process changed how he thinks about technology in medicine.

“We know that 3D printing is going to be a big part of medicine,” he said. “Just having those prerequisite skills of what it can do is extremely helpful.”

Even if most students never use a 3D printer again, the experience demystifies the technology. That’s a useful skill as doctors increasingly work with engineers, device designers and technicians who depend on advanced manufacturing tools. The Makerspace also offers something less technical but just as valuable: a shift in perspective.

“You’re studying at the same time,” Spencer said. “But you’re kind of getting outside the monotony of studying medicine.”

Medical training stresses precision and discipline. The Makerspace provides space to test, refine and try new ideas. And sometimes, all it takes to understand something is holding it in your hands.