Added social value

The Sars-CoV-19 virus has the year 2020 firmly in its grasp and poses an immense challenge on the whole world. Despite preventive hygiene measures, the virus continues to spread. Some of those infected fall seriously ill and become dependent on a secure oxygen supply. In many cases, those affected have to be treated with artificial respiration, which has already led to a shortage of intensive care ventilators in some countries. Although the worldwide production capacities of the established manufacturers have been increased significantly, they are already reaching their limits. Developing countries in particular can be hit quite hard by this shortage. That is why we are developing a simple ventilator for intensive care medicine that can be used as soon as the conventional ventilators become scarce. For the PV1000 – The People’s Ventilator, we use only resource-saving and available materials. Therefore, we have developed alternative solution concepts within a short time and will implement critical components in our own work.

Functionality

The PV1000 meets the requirements of intensive care ventilation and can ventilate patients for several weeks. In addition, our device has a simple and robust design to ensure its function even under difficult conditions, as in e.g. emergency hospitals or remote parts of the world.

Since the beginning of the 1980ies, artificial ventilators have been increasingly equipped with microprocessors to regulate airway pressure and gas flow. The inspiratory drive becameelectromagnetic. The device functions have been increasingly refined by sensors, allowing sophisticated control of flows and pressures as well as intuitive alarm concepts in case of malfunctions. Of course, the human machine interface has also been converted to electronic components.

The PV1000 meets these modern requirements and offers a relevant selection of ventilation modes expected by intensive care physicians, including measurement and alarm functions. In fact, our ventilator can perform all classical ventilation modes (pressure-controlled, volume-controlled, patient-triggered, with spontaneous breathing, etc.).

Please note that ventilators are Class IIb medical devices and are subject to the national medical device laws and the new EU Medical Device Directive (MDR), as well as the associated operator regulations, which ensure standardization within the EU and guarantee safety for users and patients. As active medical devices, ventilators may only be used by persons who are qualified for this purpose and have been instructed in the handling of the respective device type. Furthermore, they may only be manufactured by qualified personnel and developed and produced in compliance with these standards.

Our solution

The PV1000 – The People’s Ventilator is a simple and compact, yet fully-fledged intensive care ventilator, which can be used worldwide. The device is supplied medical-grade gases from pressurized gas supply lines of a hospital and requires an electrical power supply (110 – 240 V AC). The device meets the relevant safety requirements for a pandemic device.

Scalability

After the clinical testing of the prototype, two further major challenges are ahead of us – the production and the effective distribution of the PV1000. As a realisitic goal, we want to produce a total of 1,000 ventilators in sequential steps and with the help of partners from industry and academia.

Due to the modular concept, larger numbers of devices may be produced afterwards if needed.