Scientific approach to design of ALV device

In 2016, we developed the design of a portable artificial lung ventilation device housing for Triton

Task

To create a product that will be able to compete with analogues not only in the Russian but also in the foreign market of medical equipment. Take into account the peculiarities of the Russian health care system and create a high-quality and popular product.

Problem №1

Many domestic designs in the medical industry have technical advantages over their analogues, but are inferior to foreign analogues in terms of appearance and functionality.There is a overarching issue of creating a competitive product. The world’s giants of medical equipment production, having the opportunity to enter the world market, can afford large investments in the development of a new product, while its cost will be low due to the breadth of the market and as a consequence of mass production.
This cannot be said about domestic manufactures, whose market is limited to Russia and developing countries.
As a result, no matter how much manufacturers save on tooling, the cost of the final product turns out to be high, and this in turn does not allow the domestic products to compete with the foreign counterparts.
It is not an easy task to create a modern medical device without using the entire arsenal of competitors’ capabilities.
Offering the design that is not inferior to analogues, but implying a significant reduction in production costs is a typical task in the field of medical technology design, which we face constantly.

Problem №2

The domestic health care system has a specificity in comparison with the world. When developing and manufacturing medical equipment, it is necessary to take into account the requirements of the Ministry of health and the established way of life of physicians. All this implies scenarios of equipment use, which differ from the world practice.
As a result, the designed equipment should have a high degree of versatility, additional accessories suitable for use in Russia or abroad.

How did you decide

Design Research

Observations of physicians’ work in real conditions allowed us to study scenarios of equipment operation, as well as to determine ergonomic and functional criteria.
A detailed study of the environment in which the product will be operated has influenced the device layout and the external elements placement.
Interviews with physicians have allowed us to learn about medical experience and to deepen our understanding of the demand for certain functions and how to implement them.
The study of analogues made it possible to understand what niche the future product will occupy in the market, what type of buyers will be interested in it and what its cost should be.
We were able to collect many possible technical solutions and create our own ones, based on a clear problem description.

Based on our own experience in the plastic parts design and production, we have offered optimal solutions in terms of the number of parts, their complexity in order to fit into the chosen market niche and create a product that will be of interest not only to the domestic market, but also to foreign one.

The product prototype was presented at Design Next 2018