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Cheap, 3D-Printed Stethoscope Challenges Top-of-the-Line Model
mask.of.sanity writes: Tarek Loubani, an emergency physician working in the Gaza strip, has 3D-printed a 30-cent stethoscope that beats the world's best $200 equivalent as part of a project to bottom-out the cost of medical devices. Loubani together with a team of medical and technology specialists designed the stethoscope and tested it against global standard benchmarks, finding it out performed the gold-standard Littmann Cardiology 3. They now intend to make a range of ultra-low cost medical devices for the developing world.
It cost about US$10,000 to develop, and has been released as an open source model for anyone to use. Loubani says the project is following the footsteps of the free software movement and aims to replace expensive proprietary solutions. He hopes that within 25 years the devices will be common-place in the Third World, and be the "Apache of the medical world."
It cost about US$10,000 to develop, and has been released as an open source model for anyone to use. Loubani says the project is following the footsteps of the free software movement and aims to replace expensive proprietary solutions. He hopes that within 25 years the devices will be common-place in the Third World, and be the "Apache of the medical world."
Yes they do. Particularly when they're doctors in poor or war-torn areas that cannot afford access to the electronic device whose name you are unsure of.
In America, higher profits.
In developing nations, better medical care.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Ummm.... Feel free to travel to a developing nations for 'better medical care' then. If you dare.
I think the intention was to say improved medical care relative to what those developing nations were experiencing prior to the lower cost tools.
If it costs 30 to make with a 3D printer and it has a shape that can be injection-molded then it means it will only cost a few cents. Put them inside cigarette packs as a surprise, like Cracker Jack.
I suspect that $0.30 cost is just the materials used in making it. Add in design costs, buying the machine, hiring people to watch over the machines, HR, accounting, sales, and support, that stethoscope can easily cost a full $3.00.
Stethoscopes don't need to be 'tested' much. You hear stuff or not. They're not FDA approved.
We've have cheap stethoscopes that work pretty well for ages. The big deal with the Littman Cardiology scopes is that they are built like tanks and you can get replacement bits for them. MRIs use plastic stethoscopes in the MRI suite because metal ones have this annoying tendency to get rocketed into the 1 Tesla magnet at inopportune times. They cost a couple of bucks.
I'm glad they've solved their problem with a 3D printer. They could have just as well solved it with knowing a good Chinese supplier.
And pulse oximeters / EKGs - good luck with that. First off you can buy a good pulse ox for about $15, retail. I'll bet you can get them for half price in bulk. And you can buy a used, serviceable EKG for $50-100 - the big costs being the thermal paper they use.
Geez, next big thing will be a 3D printed gizmo connected to the Internet....
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
But, honestly, you can solve the problem of distribution far more cheaply than you can solve the problem of purchasing expensive things and then solving the problem of distribution. Because you'd never be able to afford to buy as many as you can print.
Yes, it will cost more to ship 1000 stethoscopes than it would to ship 3 ... but if you can print 1000 stethoscopes for less than buying those 3 ... I'm sure the agencies involved in this would love to have that problem.
I'm no doctor, but if NGOs, aid agencies, Doctors without Borders, or poor countries suddenly had 1000 (or 10,000) stethoscopes they had to figure out how to distribute ... they would be overjoyed.
Freakin' stethoscopes for everyone. I'm not seeing much of a downside here.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
In the US? No, because the costs of healthcare here aren't driven by the costs of stethoscopes. They cost a couple hundred dollars and last for a very long time; high healthcare costs are much more likely to come from "Oh, my exam showed a possible irregularity; to be safe, we should send you in for an echocardiogram (or cardiac MRI if the system has one)." And in the vast majority of cases, you get an expensive procedure to learn things are basically OK.
It's really easy to prescribe that, because hey, we have the machine and it seems a lot better to run a test when it's not needed than skip one that could have caught something serious. And since insurance covers most of it, it's not that expensive for an individual patient...
What this could help with is availability of basic healthcare where a $200 stethoscope is a really big deal -- especially if you're in an environment where equipment is likely to get damaged or stolen.