Mullingar firm's lead role in developing new ventilators for Covid-19 patients

Above: the Irish Manufacturing Research (IMR) enterprise at the old tobacco factory in Mullingar

A Mullingar firm has been involved in the development of two new ventilators for patients suffering from Covid-19.

At the moment, there is a global demand for life-saving ventilators.and Irish Manufacturing Research (IMR), which operates out of the old tobacco factory in Mullingar, has been collaborating on one project with US multinational Artesyn Biosolutions, local Irish company Airpower and one of the top global experts in ventilators, Steve Tunnell, based in San Diego, Its second collaboration si wth the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Malone Group,

IMR and the first group partners have now completed the first unit ready for shipment for testing in the US this week. This system is intended to be a ‘battlefield’ Ventilator called EirVent.

EirVent is portable with no moving parts and minimal power requirements making it ideal for use ‘in the field’. The rapid build ventilator is based on a dual supply of compressed air and oxygen delivered at a specified mix, flow and pressure.

It can also be produced at a lower cost making it affordable for COVID-19 response teams and healthcare organisations in emerging or developing markets which are now becoming epicentres for Covid-19.  These markets will be a key target for the delivery of the EirVent. IMR also developed the hardware and software for the controls.

Once approval for use is granted, the team will work with manufacturing partners to scale production to meet the needs especially in developing regions of the world.

The second system, which IMR is developing in partnership with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Malone Group, works on the principle of compressing an AMBU bag in a controlled manner directly to a patient requiring ventilation.

The AMBU bag ventilator was developed over the past 12 weeks, led by Tim Noone, Group Projects Director, Malone Group the team worked to design build a device that can deliver the basic clinical requirements of ventilation.

IMR also focussed on breathing assist modes to help with the essential task of weaning patients off full ventilation. The team worked directly with MIT to share ideas and improvements and the AMBU bag ventilator is based on an open source platform provided by MIT. The design intent is for the device to be low cost, simple and built from readily available components. A version of this was requested in the New York Emergency.

Ireland has a unique capability in that it already produces a significant portion of the world's high end ventilators already from leading international companies so there is an active program to work with local medical device manufacturers in Ireland to produce these systems here.

Barry Kennedy, CEO of Irish Manufacturing Research, said: “Thanks to the innovative work carried out by our teams in Dublin and Mullingar, including our team of 70 researchers in the midlands, and in partnership with globally recognised research institutes and companies, IMR is delivering solutions that can have a scalable and global reach.

“As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic has created a global demand for ventilators and modern life support ventilators are scarce so Ireland, through IMR playing a leading role, is helping address this demand, both right now and in the future for the expected ‘Second Wave’ of this pandemic.

“We are targeting to bring these new innovative systems to market for between €5,000 to €10,000 which is significantly below the cost of a high-end systems normally used in hospitals. We have also developed sophisticated, but readily repeatable and affordable, electronics controls and user interfaces for the caregiver to use.”