Four years later, Ms McDonald's innovative real-time monitoring pregnancy patch is one major step closer to becoming a reality, winning $1.47 million to bankroll its development thanks to the NSW government's Medical Devices Fund.

On Tuesday night at Parliament House, the "Oli" was one of four promising new medical devices awarded a share of $6.61 million in funding grants to bankroll their commercial development.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the fund gave entrepreneurs the opportunity to get game-changing ideas to market, "not only keeping medical device companies in NSW, but [also] significantly improving health outcomes and even saving patients' lives".

Ms McDonald's non-invasive pregnancy patch had the potential to help cut the rates of unnecessary interventions, and where needed, intervene earlier to avoid complications, said the PhD candidate at the University of Sydney who is conducting her research with the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital's Women and Babies team.

With a prototype in the final stages of a proof-of-concept trial involving 75 pregnant women, the device moves beyond traditional measures of contractions and fetal heart rate allowing women to follow their own pregnancy and labour timelines, instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, Ms McDonald said.

Women in labour are currently monitored via two devices strapped to thick bands wrapped around their torsos, one with a fetal heart rate sensor, the other to track the frequency of contractions.

"They are the most uncomfortable things on the planet," Ms McDonald said. "For me as a mother, it added to the anxiety of the experience.

"I was frustrated because I knew we could do better with better technology in a less invasive way."

Ms McDonald started researching other physiological tells that could be monitored to better assess the progression of pregnancy and labour.

"Instead of just looking at contraction frequencies and fetal heart rate, we want to determine the quality of pregnancy and labour itself," she said.

"Some women will have faster labours, and some labours will be longer.

"Rather than just going by the clock to determine when to use interventions [for instance induction or caesarean section], we can look at an individual's measures and say, 'You're progressing OK for you along your own timeline'.

"For others it might mean we need to intervene earlier instead of the watch-and-wait approach that can leave women and babies in distress for periods longer than necessary."

Ms McDonald was not able to disclose what measures her team were using while the device was under development.

The wireless patch would also allow women in labour to shower, have a bath and walk around, comforts current technology does not allow.

While Oli had the potential to benefit all women in labour, a second model is designed to monitor women with high-risk pregnancies in their final trimester.

The medical device would send real-time data to a woman's treating team to help inform treatment decisions and appropriately time interventions.

Ms McDonald said winning the Medical Device Fund grant "was quite emotional" after years of being told "It can't be done. Forget it, and move on".

"To start as a crazy engineer with another idea and now to see it become something that could be of clinical value ??? it's quite emotional for me.

"It's something that isn't going to just help people like me, but lots of mothers in different situations and clinicians to improve outcomes for mothers and babies."

Ms McDonald and her supervisors - head of high-risk obstetrics at RPA Professor Jon Hyett, Dr Graham Brooker at the Centre for Field Robotics at the University of Sydney, and RPA research midwife Dr Hala Phipps - hoped the device would also help hospitals better allocate resources and improve scheduling on maternity wards, as well as enrich future research into understanding pregnancy and birth trajectories.

Announcing the winners on Tuesday, Mr Hazzard said the state government was "taking home-grown medical innovation to the next level, firmly placing this state at the forefront of global health technology".

Since it began in 2013, recipients of the NSW Medical Devices Fund have been awarded more than $41 million for 24 technologies.