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A Triangular Collaboration Between South Australia, Texas, and Ethiopia Uses 3D Printing Technology and Design Innovation to Effectively Diagnose a Deadly Disease which infects a million people every year.
The kit for diagnosing leishmaniasis is tested by the Armauer Hansen Research Institute (AHRI) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, as part of a program to revolutionize the way diseases are tested and processed.
Working with the Virtual Incubator PandemicTech Venture Institute (NVI) at Flinders University in Adelaide, South Australia, Dr. Endalamaw Gadisa was able to quickly translate his knowledge of a better way to test leishmaniasis in a convenient and cost-effective design.
Leishmaniasis is a parasitic disease spread through sandfly bites. The World Health Organization estimates that up to one million new cases and 30,000 deaths occur each year, usually among malnourished people living in poverty or unsanitary conditions. Although it can lead to ulcers and death, leishmaniasis is curable if diagnosed and treated early.
Dr. Gadisa, based in Addis Ababa, identified several difficulties in screening for the disease in Ethiopia, making more effective diagnostic equipment necessary. Difficulties with the current system include the cost of a liquid medium (reagent) used for testing, the fragile specimens used to store the reagent, the challenge of seeing the samples under the microscopes available, and the time needed to obtain samples. results, which can last more than a week.
He designed a test tube that requires much less reagent (10 microliters versus 25 milliliters) and could yield results in as little as three days, but he did not have the ability to build his prototype at Addis Ababa.
Andrew Nerlinger, the director of PandemicTech in Austin, proposed to work with Dr. Gadisa as one of the initial pilot projects of the incubator, and then posed the problem to Matt Salier, director of New Venture of Flinders University. "When I finally described the project to Matt Salier at the South by Southwest conference in March 2017, he offered to collaborate and introduced me to R aphael Garcia, who eventually worked directly with Dr. Gadisa and I on several design iterations resulting in the prototype shown in the most recent photos, "said Nerlinger
The New Venture Institute is located in the Tonsley Innovation Precinct, a former car factory. transformed into a state-of-the-art manufacturing center in Adelaide, a sister city of Austin.
Salier said that the relationship with the twin city helped to start the conversation.
"Flinders NVI has a presence in our twin city for over four years with our local partner, Tech Ranch.I met Andrew from Endura Ventures while he was in the process. Establishes PandemicTech and we have seen an opportunity to apply our innovative design and manufacturing expertise to Tonsley, "said Salier
3D printer.This allowed to consider different solutions through a process of Design-Thinking before choosing the most suitable software for CAD software
Salier said that the first prototype was created using a clear liquid resin and was produced in three parts: body that will hold the fluid, a cap on the top to plug the culture tube, and a lower cap that is removable to clean the culture tube.The main body has a central hole in all the unit, to which the plugs connect, a design choice that pe allows the culture tube to be reusable and cleanable.
The design of the main body has been refined several times to increase the clarity and durability of the body, the party responsible for enabling diagnosis through microscopic inspection. Different materials were printed for the top and bottom caps to ensure that they could completely seal the main body while remaining easily removable for cleaning and sterilization.
The finished kit, which costs less than A $ 5,000 to develop, is packaged Pelican Case Shelf with Laser Cut Foam at the University. The pack also comes with special 3D printed microscopes that attach to a smart phone camera and convert the phone into a powerful 60x magnification microscope that can collect photos for diagnostic purposes. The microscope is manufactured by Go Micro, a South Australian education company based at Flinders University in Tonsley.
Despite that Austin, Adelaide and Addis Ababa are more than 10,000 km away from one of the other high-quality reusable prototypes at a fraction of the typical cost "for an illness neglected, which causes immense morbidity and mortality in the most austere and limited environments of the world's resources. "
"We were also delighted that NVI Gadisa with one of his own technologies, the microscope accessory used on a smartphone that is able to read the results of leishmaniasis tests," he said. he says, "The new test device will allow more patients to be treated sooner than the time it takes to get a diagnosis." It will also allow health workers to provide a diagnosis to patients while performing medical work in areas most affected by leishmaniasis
"If the tests are successful, it is possible to create a financially viable business.
Salier stated that projects like these were exactly the reason why Flinders NVI was still trying to demonstrate how new technologies and new business models could solve the large-scale problems that society was facing. faces.
do not need more software to solve problems already solved 10 times, what we need, it is innovation that has an impact, which creates value in applying new approaches to global challenges.
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