A low-cost, helmet-based, non-invasive ventilator for COVID-19

Khan, Yasser; Fahad, Hossain Mohammad; Muin, Sifat; Gopalan, Karthik

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has created an unprecedented need for breathing assistance devices. Since the demand for commercial, full-featured ventilators is far higher than the supply capacity, many rapid-response ventilators are being developed for invasive mechanical ventilation of patients. Most of these emergency ventilators utilize mechanical squeezing of bag-valve-masks or Ambu-bags. These"bag squeezer"designs are bulky and heavy, depends on many moving parts, and difficulty to assemble and use. Also, invasive ventilation requires intensive care unit support, which may be unavailable to a vast majority of patients, especially in developing countries. In this work, we present a low-cost ($<$\$200), portable (fits in an 8"x8"x4"box), non-invasive ventilator (NIV), designed to provide relief to early-stage COVID-19 patients in low-resource settings. We used a high-pressure blower fan for providing noninvasive positive-pressure ventilation. Our design supports continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) and bilevel positive airway pressure (BiPAP) modes. A common concern of using CPAP or BiPAP for treating COVID-19 patients is the aerosolization of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). We used a helmet-based solution that contains the spread of the virus. Our end-to-end solution is compact, low-cost ($<$\$400 including the helmet, viral filters, and a valve), and easy-to-use. Our NIV provides 0-20 cmH$_{2}$O pressure with flow rates of 60-180 Lmin$^{-1}$. We hope that our report will encourage implementations and further studies on helmet-based NIV for treating COVID-19 patients in low-resource settings.