MAMBU-T1 #HackTechCOVID

mambu
Pruebas con pulmones artificiales 1 (Primer Prototipo)
Pruebas con pulmones artificiales 2 (Sexta versión del prototipo)
Pruebas con pulmones artificiales 3 (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu sin ambu 3 (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu sin ambu 2 (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu sin ambu 1 (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu vista trasera con ambu (Sexta versión del prototipo)
posicionamiento de ambu en el mambu (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu con mascarilla (Sexta versión del prototipo)
mambu en pruebas con emuladores de pacientes adultos (Sexta versión del prototipo)

Problem

In Bolivia the first two cases of COVID-19, were confirmed on 10 March 2020 in the departments of Oruro and Santa Cruz, in a short time we can arrive to face the same medical saturation problem as Italy. One variable that we should see are case predictions; the Bolivian Ministry of Health predict we can have 1500 cases in the next 3 weeks. Unfortunately, Bolivia only has 252 mechanical ventilators to treat severe cases of covid-19, that’s mean that we could see a saturation of the medical system in less than a month.

Solution

Our solution is to give the medical system a break, developing emergency mechanicals respirators, for that we develop the MAMBU, which stands for Mechatronic-AMBU, is an automated version of the well-known self-inflating bag for air ventilation.

The device employs a simple but effective gear crank mechanism supported by stepper DC motors that allows the bag’s fast recovery once it is firmly squeezed. The electromechanical components are operated by an embedded microcontroller which lets achieving custom output air pressure and different ventilation rhythms. For this, visual easy-to-use and intuitive controls are available for the device manager, thought to be specialized medical personal. MAMBU is cheap and easy to manufacture, our plan is to develop 300 MAMBU units, to distribute throughout the country.

Expected achievements

With the help of 300 MAMBU units, we hope that the Bolivian health system can breathe a little more. Particularly in rural regions, where they do not have a hospital with a mechanical ventilator to treat these cases. Future challenges.

It should be noted that we do not plan to replace professional mechanical ventilators, but in the case of a saturation of the medical system, the need to transport a patient or other type of emergency, it is necessary to use the MAMBU.

Future challenges

To achieve a more complete development of the system we need to advance even more. That is why we are days away from implementing an IOT system to have a more complete operation of the MAMBU and better air filter systems for the ambu.

The IOT system will be in charge of controlling different variables to remotely verify the use of the MAMBUS, the variables that are planned to be controlled with, the engine speed (to verify the amount of air volume that the system is supplying). In general speaking our IOT approach is thought to include many other variables that are critical for patient monitoring in real time

For now, we focus on acquiring emergency button auctioning data. Real time communication is achieved through employment of a web platform over socket io architecture And NODEMcu. Also we are looking for a battery system which let the device works for at least 4 hours in order to use it as a transportation and support medical device.

We are also days away from implementing a filter system when the patient blows the air out of his lungs, this in order to avoid further contagion by saliva droplets that may exist in the environment and protect the doctors.

Tools and methods

MAMBU is an automation system for ambu bags composed mainly of a MDF complementary structure and electromechanical actuators. The final MDF structure is built from stacking many MDF layers the electormechanical actuators are controlled by a simple but effective and low-risk control schema, where each desired result of frequency or volume is linked to an amount of steps for the stepper DC motor, to link an amount ofsteps of the stepper DC motor we used specialized tools to know what features our device produces, these meant to perform a huge amount of tests in which we are still working, our goal is to establish a very controlled schema of output features to minimize risk, the electronic part of the device is designed through Proteus Electronics Suite and also simulated in such tool. The whole design and mechanical movement is simulated in Solidworks. This allows us to have estimations regarding stress and friction, and also movement patterns. The pressure is executed through a griddle, the pressure has that shape to reduce stress over the AMBU. Principally we are using a Node MCU and Arduino Nano for many of our tasks.

MAMBU team

The Bambu multidisciplinary team has the support of professionals in mechatronics and biomedical engineers from the Research, Development and Innovation in Mechatronics Engineering Center (CIDIMEC) from the Universidad Catolica Boliviana (UCB La Paz), the complete team are: Eng. Fabio Diaz, Eng. Guillermo Sahonero, Eng. Guillermo Manning, Est. Anna Montevilla, Eng. Khalil Nallar, Eng. Jhon Ordoñez, Est. Renan Espinar, Eng. Gabriel Rojas, Eng. Rodrigo Botelho, Arq. Diego Suarez, Eng. Oscar Crispín, Eng. Juan Manuel Valverde and Freddy Ferrufino.