Indian Navy doctors develop innovative protective equipment

A team from the Institute of Naval Medicine and the Naval Dockyard in Mumbai worked together to design a new form of PPE, to face the country’s shortages of this equipment.

The design has been tested and approved for use in clinical settings by India’s Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, the official authority in testing and certification of PPE.
The protective equipment is made of an innovative breathable fabric, in order to make doctors more comfortable under the hot and humid weather conditions in India.

"As a doctor I can say, most of the PPE available in the Indian market are ignoring the ''breathability'' factor. Because of this, the health care workers get easily exhausted due to the prolonged use of substandard, low quality PPE." said Surgeon Lieutenant Commander Arnab Ghosf, from the Institute of Naval Medicine in Mumbai

The Indian Navy has filled to patent the design and material, to facilitate mass production of the product. Due to the simplicity of the design and cost-effective production, it costs significantly less than the PPEs currently available in the market.

"It took me seven days to make this PPE. I had to do extensive research about a wide variety of fabrics, had to study different medical garments like headgears, gloves etc. Due to the lockdown it was even difficult for us to obtain the raw materials. After much research I arrived at this new technology," explained the Surgeon Lieutenant Commander.

Adapted from: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/navy-developed-ppe-gets-approval-...
https://www.outlookindia.com/newsscroll/indian-navys-breathable-ppe-kit-...