Adaptive Manufacturing for Healthcare During the COVID-19 Emergency and Beyond

Vallatos, Antoine and Maguire, James M. and Pilavakis, Nikolas and Cerniauskas, Gabrielis and Sturtivant, Alexander and Speakman, Alexander J. and Gourlay, Steve and Inglis, Scott and McCall, Graham and Davie, Andrew and Boyd, Mike and Tavares, Adriana A. S. and Doherty, Connor and Roberts, Sharen and Aitken, Paul and Mason, Mark and Cummings, Scott and Mullen, Andrew and Paterson, Gordon and Proudfoot, Matthew and Brady, Sean and Kesterton, Steven and Queen, Fraser and Fletcher, Steve and Sherlock, Andrew and Dunn, Katherine E. (2021) Adaptive Manufacturing for Healthcare During the COVID-19 Emergency and Beyond. Frontiers in Medical Technology, 3. ISSN 2673-3129

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Abstract

During the COVID-19 pandemic, global health services have faced unprecedented demands. Many key workers in health and social care have experienced crippling shortages of personal protective equipment, and clinical engineers in hospitals have been severely stretched due to insufficient supplies of medical devices and equipment. Many engineers who normally work in other sectors have been redeployed to address the crisis, and they have rapidly improvised solutions to some of the challenges that emerged, using a combination of low-tech and cutting-edge methods. Much publicity has been given to efforts to design new ventilator systems and the production of 3D-printed face shields, but many other devices and systems have been developed or explored. This paper presents a description of efforts to reverse engineer or redesign critical parts, specifically a manifold for an anaesthesia station, a leak port, plasticware for COVID-19 testing, and a syringe pump lock box. The insights obtained from these projects were used to develop a product lifecycle management system based on Aras Innovator, which could with further work be deployed to facilitate future rapid response manufacturing of bespoke hardware for healthcare. The lessons learned could inform plans to exploit distributed manufacturing to secure back-up supply chains for future emergency situations. If applied generally, the concept of distributed manufacturing could give rise to “21st century cottage industries” or “nanofactories,” where high-tech goods are produced locally in small batches.

Item Type: Article
Subjects: STM Repository > Medical Science
Depositing User: Managing Editor
Date Deposited: 21 Feb 2023 07:01
Last Modified: 09 Nov 2024 03:54
URI: http://classical.goforpromo.com/id/eprint/1939

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