Title
: DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF A LOW-COST AUTOMATIC VENTILATOR
Description
: The number of ventilators in Bangladesh is around 1,769, which means an average of one ventilator available for every 93,273 persons. The most pressing shortages facing hospitals during the COVID-19 emergency is a lack of ventilators. These machines can keep patients breathing when they no longer can on their own and they can cost around $30,000 each. Design and development of a low-cost portable ventilator could be a possible way, that can help pneumonia cases of COVID-19 patient in Bangladesh. However, the proposed low-cost ventilator delivers breaths by compressing a conventional Bag Valve Mask (BVM) or
Ambu bag with a pivoting motor drive mechanism, eliminating the need for a human operator. Among other features, the machine should have invasive and non-invasive feature, and supports 500- 600 mL tidal volume, with a continuous working capability for several days. Based on the calculation, 12 Respiratory rates (RR)/min can provide the required amount of tidal volume to the pneumonia patient. Moreover, Strategy of automatic arm actuated BVM compression is proven to be a viable option to achieve low-cost, less power consumption and portable ventilator machine.
