I was president of the IET for 2016-17, and have been asked by government to gather practical and innovative ideas from our Engineering communities. So, please enter any ideas you might have in this thread that might help address and mitigate the Covid-19 crisis. Ideas might include digital tracking / monitoring through therapy equipment and beyond. Even ideas outside your usual expertise domain will be welcome. Now’s the time for Engineering to show we can change the world!
Many of us who have manufacturing and design capability are working outside the medical industry, to vastly different EU Directives and standards. If we have some cross-over capability, how do we quickly get to find out what needs adapting in practise to safely meet the standards required?
To go through a new set of audits etc with a different Notified Body would likely take too long, even if practical right now.
Thank you for opening up this forum topic. I'm a VC investor with a number of companies that want to make a difference.
One company delivers data visualizations that marry with predictive analytics. It helps users to drill down into data better to gain hindsight, insight and foresight into what happened and what might happen.
I'm not advertising their name here, but I'd be delighted to effect an introduction. They are very keen to make a difference in whatever way they can.
We believe it may be helpful if the government or local authorities want to set up war rooms to better understand and manage a range of public health initiatives - including distribution of the disease, antibody results, medical equipment, vaccines etc - over the course of the pandemic.
Here is a simple example visualisation but the software is of course very flexible and interactive.
Can a patient be intubated early on, before they need to be placed on a ventilator? i.e. with the patient breathing manually through the tube, not using a ventilator.
It seems the tubes have expanding cuffs, which would act as a seal to block the upper respiratory virus from reaching the lower respiratory system. (I'm assuming that would work, to keep the virus in the upper respiratory system only)
I have no medical expertise, but according to several news articles Covid-19 starts off as an upper respiratory infection, before later becoming a lower respiratory infection, which is when it requires ventilators and ICU care.
Other lower respiratory infections are caused by "inhalation of aerosolised material", "aspiration of upper airway flora" or by "hematogenous seeding".
So would it be possible to prevent the upper respiratory infection from becoming the more dangerous lower respiratory infection, by sealing recently diagnosed peoples Tracheas shut?
This would use an expanding seal, which has a tube through the middle to allow air flow to the lungs from a clean air source, bypassing the upper respiratory system.
The expanding seal and tube would be similar, in concept, to the plastic lid and straw that you get with a McDonalds cup.
If this works then it should reduce the number of Covid-19 cases that become the dangerous version, which requires ventilator support.
Within the last week I saw a news item where the person being interviewed said that ways had to be found to source the electronics for ventilators. I presume he was referring to control systems. The thought that crossed my mind was that there must be a large stock of retired or superseded mobile phones in drawers around the country. After all people are forever being encouraged to upgrade. Working on the belief that a smart phone is really a computer with a fairly powerful processor. If a call is put out for retired mobile phones to be donated to be used a control systems for ventilators, would this solve the problem? I have not thought about whether the android or IOS operating systems should be retained and the control system for the ventilator should be a single app on the smart phone.
I was president of the IET for 2016-17, and have been asked by government to gather practical and innovative ideas from our Engineering communities. So, please enter any ideas you might have in this thread that might help address and mitigate the Covid-19 crisis. Ideas might include digital tracking / monitoring through therapy equipment and beyond. Even ideas outside your usual expertise domain will be welcome. Now’s the time for Engineering to show we can change the world!
Can IET offer a mechanism to match companies looking for additional engineering people at this time - i.e. companies stretched making /servicing ventilators and other medical kit? Appreciate the special skills / training required for medical standards; nonetheless I bet there could be loads of retired / displaced engineers who could prettry quickly come up the learning curve - for design, testing, manufacturing, documentation, sourcing, etc.
Concept - Portable respiratory support for emergency situations – Can SCUBA diving kit be easily adapted to provide it?
This is an idea we've been looking at with and Engineer / Scuba Diver. I appreciate that it may not be the first port of call but we see it is as a possible solution should care and mass recovery be moved to non-hospital situations, possibly without impacting existing supply chains.
Dear Colleague, I am looking to see if you, or someone you know may have any ideas, feedback, or support on the attached idea for emergency respiratory support systems. Covid-19 is causing unprecedented need for ventilation, even with increased manufacture will demand be met? If hospitals are at capacity improvised sites may need to be used, without plumbed oxygen. While we may not be at the point to need to think quite this laterally –we may yet reach it. There are 3 levels of respiratory support solution discussed, and while they may not currently be suitable for a hospital, they may be ideas which could prove useful in extreme or mass recovery situations (e.g. use of Stadiums to house patients). It should also not impact existing supply lines. If not for this virus - then the next where solutions that could call in civilian equipment & hold a library of designs for manufacture could prove vital. Please take a moment to review the attached summary and supporting information, and respond with your thoughts. Please feel free to share it, as the aim here is to think of possible solutions, and work out if they could feasibly work, then develop them - which is why it’s being shared at such an early thought stage. In the hope that it may be useful to develop – or may trigger some ideas in others which it can help. Thank you for your time, and please stay safe.
