Slashdot Mirror
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."
In America, higher profits.
In developing nations, better medical care.
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.