Low-cost 3D printed simulators facilitate rural medical training
University of Mercer team develops 3D printed cricothyrotomy and chest tube trainers
Medical simulation devices play an important role in training paramedics and medical students, enabling them to practice and perfect tricky procedures before administering them on a patient. In my cases, however, these simulators are very costly, which means that mainly those in well-resourced institutions have access to the effective training tools. In order to address this accessibility issue, a team from Mercer University in Georgia has developed a series of very low-cost 3D printed simulation devices that can help improve medical training in rural and under-resourced areas.
Faculty and students at the university’s School of Medicine and School of Engineering teamed up to develop two types of simulators: a cricothyrotomy trainer for practicing the eponymous emergency procedure, in which a tube is placed through a hole in the neck to the trachea to create a breathing passage; and a chest tube trainer for learning how to insert a chest tube into the space around the lungs for air or fluid removal. While essential training tools, conventional devices can cost anywhere from several hundred to thousands of dollars.
For the Mercer team led by Dr. Yahya Acar, there was a clear opportunity to create a more affordable solution that would increase access in rural parts of the state. “Most simulators on the market are expensive and inaccessible for rural programs and institutions,” Dr. Acar explained. “What makes our work different is we provide them from the ground up with accessibility, low-cost and reproduction in mind. Our goal was never to replace high-end simulations but bridge the gap between training or make it possible for rural or limited resource departments.”
3D printing has been central to the project and has enabled the multidisciplinary team to design, prototype, and test the simulator devices. Notably, the university offers a 3D printing and FDA regulations course, which played an important role in identifying suitable applications and designs. The prototypes were tested by surgery residents at Memorial Health University Medical Center and attending physicians in the university’s simulation lab and are now being used on both Mercer’s Savannah and Valdosta campuses.
The goal, ultimately, is to share the 3D designs for both devices freely so that any training center or medical institution can 3D print their own low-cost devices. The team expects the greatest impact of its project will be on rural communities where, for instance, a paramedic training program with more limited resources could 3D print the simulators and offer hands-on training to volunteers. “This is a low-cost alternative for the people who work for Mercer Medicine and around Georgia,” said Joe Slattery, assistant director of medical simulation for the School of Medicine. “We can send these trainers to them for pennies on the dollar for what it would cost to get commercial trainers.”
The medical accessibility project has already captured interest from outside the state: in January the simulators received the Best Impact Award at the Society for Simulation in Healthcare’s International Meeting on Simulation in Healthcare (IMSH) in Texas. At the University of Florida, the Center for Safety Simulation & Advanced Learning Technologies in the Department of Anesthesiology has also requested to use the designs in its courses.
The use of 3D printing has not only been central to developing more cost-effective training tools, it will also enable training programs and medical institutions to easily replace simulators when they become worn or defective. The agile nature of the technology also means that designs can continually be improved upon or updated for different applications. For instance, the team is thinking of developing smaller models for pediatric training, while the University of Florida Center for Safety Simulation & Advanced Learning Technologies suggested a tweak to facilitate advanced ultrasound-guided cricothyrotomies.
“That [IMSH] award has given the project great visibility and momentum,” Dr. Acar added. “We were already planning to move forward with a couple of ideas. Now we are encouraged to work harder and move faster to meet that demand. The project ultimately aims to build a sustainable ecosystem for [medical] simulation, and that meets the Mercer mission to improve the health care training in rural Georgia.”
