With hospitals around the country desperate for ventilators during the coronavirus pandemic, a group of engineers from Maryland have found a cheap way to supply the demand.
Brandi Gerstner was rummaging around in her basement recently when she came across an old $200 Spectra breast pump.
“[A breast pump] does pulsing intervals. It is a sanitize-able biomedical device that’s approved by the [FDA]…You know they’re reliable, they’ve been used by moms everywhere for decades,” Brandi told Southern Maryland news outlet The Bay Net.
Aware of the life and death need for ventilators across the nation during this crisis, Brandi had the the ingenious thought to reverse the function of her breast pump.
“What if I could make it blow rather than suck? And so I grabbed my old one from the basement, grabbed a screwdriver and an X-Acto knife… Sure enough, you can turn it around very, very easily.”
And the discovery could not be more timely. Medical professionals across the nation have resorted to remodeling sleep apnea machines as a “last resort,” in the fight against COVID-19. But Brandi’s breast pump solution is more affordable, and easily accessible.
By reversing two little valves, the engineering team — Brandi and Grant Gerstner, Alex Scott and Rachel LaBatt — are turning the negative-pressure breast pump (one that draws out fluid) into an “intermittent positive pressure ventilation” machine that blows air.
“We can bypass the circuit board of the breast pump to control the exhale-to-inhale ratio, the volume of air and the respiratory rate,” LaBatt, 24, told Yahoo Lifestyle. “We basically want the device to listen to our circuit board.”
The team is able to create a $300 prototype in just four hours. Normal ventilators can range from $25,000 too $50,000.
The goal is to get their reversed-breast-pump-ventilator approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which in March enacted an Emergency Use Authorization to allow “positive pressure breathing devices modified for use as ventilators.”
Until then, the team is accepting donations of breast pumps to create prototypes, and using readily available parts as to not contribute to the ventilator shortage.
In March, mothers around the Maryland community donated 27 breast pumps in just 48 hours through the Facebook page Rapidly Deployable Breast Pump Ventilator to Combat Coronavirus. The team received another 30 donations on Tuesday.
“A mother recently told me that she is ‘lucky to help millions in crisis’ and that made me tear up,” says LaBatt. “These women spent so many long hours with their pumps, and now are helping. Mothers are incredible.”
