Breathing problems are at the root of 1.8 million stillbirths and neonatal deaths that occur every year. Many of these deaths could have been prevented if health facilities had adequate equipment and proper training programs available.

Having worked with over 1,000 healthcare providers in Uganda’s Helping Babies Breathe (HBB) program, Dr. Data Santorino is intimately familiar with this issue. Alongside Kevin Cedrone, Craig Mielcarz and Dr. Kristian Olson, Dr. Santorino developed the Augmented Infant Resuscitator (AIR) as an inexpensive and effective solution.

AIR is an add-on to already existing emergency ventilation equipment that provides real-time feedback to birth attendants. The feedback incorporates both an assessment of the quality of emergency ventilation administration and “actionable cues” for users to take up.

These cues are vital to the babies under neonatal care. They not only help users improve their performance but also build their confidence in the abilities that they have to care for the newborn.

Because the feedback also helps to improve skills, AIR alleviates former inadequacies in neonatal resuscitation training. With the device, users can put their skills to use while also learning and maintaining proper practices.

AIR may prove especially helpful in developing countries where proper equipment is often too costly or inaccessible and training of healthcare professionals remains seriously insufficient.

Currently, birth attendants administering emergency assisted ventilation will periodically stop the process in order to manually check and monitor the baby’s heart rate. This interruption within the first “golden minute” after a baby is born could prove detrimental, according to Santorino, as the lack of oxygen could either kill the baby or cause other health issues such as brain damage.

As the first place winner for the best pitch at the Boston Children’s Hospital Innovation Tank, AIR continues to be developed and improved. Its first deployment is projected for January 2017.

– Jocelyn Lim

Sources: Elsevier, Augmented Infant Resuscitator, Boston Children’s Hospital, MIT Ideas Global Challenge
Photo: Flickr