First Breath - A premature infant intubation simulation

Project Description and Requirements

Our Senior Design team was tasked with outlining, designing, and manufacturing a practice tool for neonatologists at the University of Iowa that simulated intubation on exceptionally small premature infants. It needed to be realistically challenging, but simple and cheap enough that that multiple could be produced and given to residents as needed for individual practice.

Functional Requirements

  • Realistic to 22 week premature infant

  • Accessible to training medical students and residents

  • Compatible with existing tools

  • Gives a quantitative measure of performance

  • Reusable

Design Parameters

  • Anatomically correct upper airway

  • Tissue material matches real flesh mechanical properties

  • User friendly, easily cleaned, and portable

  • Works with any laryngoscope and endotracheal tube of the proper size

  • Does not interfere with electronics

  • Tracks time to simulation completion

  • Provides feedback if the tube is placed improperly or with excessive force

  • Components durable up to 1000 uses and easily replicable

Features of the glottis, trachea, and mouth were modeled in CREO parametric using measurements from the literature as a guide. These parts with fit to a generic infant head model using Meshmixer

The molds were cast with a silicone matching the elasticity of skin, then assembled with strain gauges in key anatomical locations

Meshmixer was further used to turn the surface models into 3D printable molds

I cannot take credit for this last part, but the year following my graduation the project continued with a new group of seniors that was tasked with combining the First Breath prototype with another neonatal procedure into a complete simulation platform. I had the honor of being asked to peer mentor both that team and another simulation team on how to create molded soft tissue parts. Being on the other side of the mentor/student collaboration was interesting and a lot of fun! I was really proud of those teams and hope to mentor more in the future.