Can a Biomedical Engineering Student Be Expelled for Fabricating Defibrillator Energy Output Calibration Logs?

A university will summarily expel a biomedical or clinical engineering undergraduate, cancel all clinical instrumentation and medical equipment testing credits, and report the student to the Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN) for professional debarment for fabricating hospital cardiac defibrillator energy discharge calibration logs, faking delivered energy joules (200J to 360J) into 50-ohm resistive test loads, or forging biomedical engineering laboratory instructor verification signatures without performing physical defibrillator analyzer testing. In biomedical engineering curricula accredited by COREN, medical equipment calibration—including coupling biphasic defibrillators to certified biomedical energy analyzers, measuring discharge waveform durations, peak currents, and cardiac synchronization delays—represents a life-critical clinical competency; fabricating defibrillator calibration data conceals lethal cardiac pacing or shock delivery failures, endangers hospital patients during cardiac arrest resuscitations, and violates professional engineering ethics.

Departmental laboratory coordinators and clinical engineering examiners utilize instrument testing registers to detect fabricated calibration submissions.

1. The medical instrumentation course lecturer audits submitted practical portfolios and identifies mathematically idealized energy delivery curves that ignore high-voltage capacitor charging circuit degradation.
2. The chief laboratory technologist checks the biomedical calibration laboratory sign-in register and confirms that the student never signed out defibrillator analyzers, patient simulators, or safety analyzers.
3. The technologist checks electrical safety testing records and confirms that no high-voltage discharge trials were executed on the laboratory defibrillators during the claimed testing hours.
4. The student is formally issued an academic query requiring them to perform a live energy discharge calibration on a clinical defibrillator and interpret biphasic truncated exponential waveforms.
5. Inability to demonstrate high-voltage safety precautions or replicate energy calculations leads to a formal charge of scientific fabrication and academic fraud.
6. The Head of Department forwards an investigative report to the Faculty of Engineering Board and the University Student Disciplinary Committee (SDC).
7. The student appears before the disciplinary committee to defend their submissions under constitutional principles of fair hearing.
8. The University Senate considers the committee’s findings and ratifies an order of rustication or summary expulsion.

Acquiring hands-on competency in medical equipment calibration is essential for clinical engineers who will commission, inspect, and certify life-support equipment in hospital intensive care units.

• Standardized biomedical engineering laboratory manual with approved defibrillator calibration protocols.
• Raw bench workbook recording selected energy, delivered energy, peak voltage, discharge duration, and battery charge times.
• Medical equipment testing bay sign-in register confirming equipment allocation and analyzer usage.
• Digital waveform captures displaying defibrillator monophasic or biphasic current discharge profiles.

Students must record actual experimental measurements honestly, accounting for internal energy dissipation and capacitor age variations, rather than manufacturing idealized calibration data.

Under COREN professional regulations and university examination codes, fabricating life-support medical device testing data is classified as severe academic fraud, carrying mandatory expulsion and total debarment from the engineering profession nationwide.

Maintaining rigorous laboratory ethics ensures that biomedical engineering diplomates and graduates develop sound technical judgement required to maintain clinical medical technologies safely.