IoT-Based Low-Cost Portable Ventilator.
The number of ventilators in the hospitals is very less in comparison to the patients in the ICU. The idea behind this proposed prototype is to make it robust, rapidly manufacturable to ramp up production during this Covid-19 pandemic.
It is also low-cost, compact, lightweight and thus making it portable. This model will require testing for medical validation assuring as the last resort during mass casualty event but it cannot replace the medical-grade ventilators.
The hardware can be categorized into three parts:
1.Breathing circuit, 2.Mechanical system, 3.Controls
The breathing circuit consists of the Ambu bag, the single limb breathing circuit, and the mask. Ambu bag is the heart of the ventilator which is a manual resuscitator generally squeezed by medical staff to push air into the lungs. But this is a temporary technique. In our prototype, we have arranged two curved shapes of fingers to compress the bag in a gentle way, and the air flows out to the patient through the breathing pipe and the mask. There are three input parameters which are the TV, I: E ratio, BPM that can be both manually and remotely controlled by using an App.
There are two types of modes that are incorporated in our model, i.e; Assist Control and Volume Control. In assist control mode, the ventilator will deliver a fixed tidal volume at set intervals of time or when the patient initiates a breath. For this, two pressure sensors are attached to monitor the pressure, Tidal Volume, and flow.
In volume control mode, the ventilator will deliver a breath with preset Tidal Volume and constant flow.
The main objective/aim behind the development of an App is to keep the medical staff and the doctors safe by remotely controlling the ventilatory parameters outside the ICU and also by monitoring these parameters and the waveforms through the App, which makes the design novel as it is a no-contact use between the patient and the doctors.
This prototype is designed by students of Electrical Engineering department of Tezpur university for their final year project.
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