NIT Durgapur students build ‘Pranesh,’ an economic ventilator for COVID-19 patients
National Institute of Technology (NIT) Durgapur has developed an affordable, plug-and-use and easily maintainable semi-automatic Ambu Bag ventilator system in close collaboration and supervision of clinical physicians. A bag valve mask (BVM) has been in use for more than fifty years and is usually named as Ambu Bag. It is a manual resuscitator and self-inflating bag and a hand-held medical apparatus, which is commonly used to provide positive pressure ventilation to the patients, who suffer from inadequate breathing. A face mask is plugged over the patient’s airway and the required amount of oxygen is pumped by squeezing the Ambu bag at a rate of 12 to 16 breaths per minute for adults. The bag can be repeatedly squeezed out and re-inflated rapidly to resuscitate the patients by providing adequate oxygen. The same Ambu bag can be used to provide assisted ventilation through endotracheal tube to Covid-19 patients.
At a time when an increase in number of COVID-19 patients can lead to a shortage of ventilators in India, this Ambu Bag ventilator can come to the rescue. Generally, this medical apparatus is hand operated by highly skilled health-staff and getting so many staff engaged for each patient can be a problem in the current situation where the number of patients is quite high. Therefore, the present situation demands automatic pressurization of the Ambu bag and an affordable but reliable mechanism for the same. The mechanized Ambu Bag ventilator invented by NIT Durgapur students is economic, simple and amenable to easy production. The required clinical parameters of Ambu bag pressurization, such as strokes per minute, volume per stroke, etc can be controlled mechanically. A wonderful name has been given to these ventilators --- PRANESH. Indeed, they will act as a messiah of life, or praan. The systems have been clinically tested and till now have been found satisfactory enough for crisis situations meeting the clinical requirements.
In case a large number of COVID 19 cases are reported, these ventilators can supplement a regular ventilator. The model can also be attached to each ICU bed and ambulances with slight modification. The key developers of this project were Dr. Nirmal Baran Hui, Dr. Nilanjan Chattaraj and Dr. Hardik Rajyaguru and the team under Prof. Anupam Basu are ready to help in the commercial production of this ventilator if need be.
