Doctor invents low-cost solution to help prevent babies to die from pneumonia

Mohammod Jobayer Chisti, from Bangladesh, was a medical intern when he saw three children die from pneumonia. Because of that, he was driven to produce a low-cost device to prevent babies from dying from pneumonia.

Hospitals use ventilators to help kids with pneumonia do breathe. But each of this machine is very expensive for the hospitals in Bangladesh.

So, after doing research for 20 years, Mohammod started using shampoo bottles to create a low-cost device as an alternative. He got the idea for this gadget after seeing a machine in Australia that uses continuous positive airway pressure to prevent the lungs from collapsing, helping the body to absorb enough oxygen.

With the help of a colleague, he took a plastic shampoo bottle, filled it with water and inserted one end of some plastic supply tubing. The pressure from the bubbles keeps the small air sacs of the lungs open.

"The children inhale oxygen from a tank and exhale through a tube which is inserted into a bottle of water producing bubbles in the water."We tested it on four or five patients at random. We saw a significant improvement within a few hours”, Mohammod explained.

The innovator ran a trial and then published the result in a scientific magazine. It showed children treated with the bubble CPAP device had much lower death rates compared with those treated with low-flow oxygen. At a cost of just $1.25, the device appeared to cut mortality rates by 75%.

The device also makes much more efficient use of oxygen, slashing the hospital's annual oxygen bill from $30,000 to just $6,000.

Up to 2017, about 600 children benefited from this solution. Mohammod’s goal is that all developing countries have this gadget available in their hospitals.

Adapted from: https://bbc.in/2Nx9ob3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HM1E8yMJd5Q