Marek Swoboda has been working on a breathing vest for C-O-P-D patients.
[Ads /]
Swoboda thought the request from Penn's health system last month was impossible, creating 500 basic ventilators in two weeks. But his start-up, "RightAir" built a prototype in just five days.
Swoboda's "Y-vent" uses $10 in materials, with a Y-shaped mechanism made on a 3D printer. It's based on simple ventilators used by the Army and rescue teams half a century ago.
The ventilator is disposable and can be hooked up to standard hospital air pressure lines, or even a compressor.
"Which is fantastic for this particular application, because we have COVID-19 infected patients and we don't want to have this issue with disinfection and a lot of equipment which needs to be cleaned," said Swoboda.
[Ads /]
RightAir has made the design open-source, so anyone can access the plans.
Swoboda wants to make some improvements, and apply for FDA approval.
Hopefully, Swoboda says, we'll never need these for the pandemic, but could be life-savers for EMS teams or military field medics.