Netherlands-based non-profit 3D Sierra Leone has been nominated for an award by the World Well being Group (WHO) in recognition of its work in 3D printing prosthetics for the West African nation’s amputees.
For almost 4 years now, the group has used 3D printing alongside scanning gear offered by SHINING 3D to supply prosthetics for amputees within the nation with out entry to postoperative care. In recognition of those efforts, the group has been shortlisted for the WHO’s Particular Prize on Well being Innovation, which celebrates these tasks that search to profit the wellbeing of individuals around the globe.
3D Sierra Leone’s prosthetic undertaking
As beforehand reported by 3D Printing Trade in 2020, Sierra Leone is a rustic whose healthcare system stays unable to cope with the injuries brought on by site visitors accidents or infections, thus it continues to see a lot of amputations. The nation’s lack of medical sources on this space are compounded by the truth that it’s nonetheless house to many amputees that survived its Civil Struggle (1991-2002).
To make issues worse, as a result of nation’s lack of supplies, employees and knowhow, many of those sufferers don’t have entry to prosthetics, a difficulty that in line with 3D Sierra Leone, can go away the bothered feeling “jealous, insecure and depressed.”
In response to this drawback, the group arrange a pilot 3D lab at Masanga Hospital in Sierra Leone throughout 2018, at which it sought to check the feasibility of 3D printing low-cost prosthetics and different medical aids. Following the preliminary success of those trials, 3D Sierra Leone then started producing synthetic limbs for individuals to make use of in follow, alongside college students from the College of Twente and TU Delft.
Collectively, the undertaking’s individuals have devised a workflow, through which a affected person’s stump might be scanned utilizing a SHINING 3D EinScan Professional 2X Plus, over the course of round 20 minutes. This information can then be fed into Meshmixer software program, the place it’s changed into a 3D prosthetic mannequin, which in flip, might be 3D printed from locally-sourced wooden.
3D Sierra Leone says this standardized setup is extra sustainable and inexpensive than regular prosthetic manufacturing strategies, enabling it to be carried out independently by native communities. For the reason that undertaking started, the potential of the group’s method has been borne out in a sequence of case research that has seen numerous victims of illness and street accidents achieve new synthetic limbs.
In a single such use case, a younger boy was compelled to have his proper leg amputated at Masanga Hospital again in 2020, however after visiting 3D Sierra Leone, he was quickly again on the transfer with a customized prosthetic. As of December final 12 months, the affected person had a brilliant purple synthetic limb (his favourite coloration), and the Dutch researchers behind the undertaking had dedicated to making a length-adjustable substitute for him quickly.
In between serving to numerous different amputees, the 3D Sierra Leone workforce has additionally made time to iterate upon their manufacturing course of. Throughout August 2021, the group revealed that it was growing a brand new design program which might assist additional simplify and automate its prosthetic manufacturing workflow, making it simpler for locals to make use of themselves.
Shifting forwards, in its most up-to-date replace, the group mentioned that it meant to proceed working within the nation, with Pien de Graaf, a pupil on the College of Twente, anticipated to proceed searching for new methods of optimizing its operations there.
These serious about discovering out extra about 3D Sierra Leone’s case research can entry them by way of the ‘Venture’ tab on the group’s devoted web site.
A WHO Particular Prize nomination
In gentle of the humanitarian work achieved as a part of 3D Sierra Leone’s undertaking, it has now been shortlisted for the WHO’s Particular Prize on Well being Innovation 2022. The award seeks to acknowledge people who have developed social, digital or technological improvements which have a optimistic affect on the well being of native communities.
3D Sierra Leone’s initiative has been nominated for the prize alongside eight others with similarly-good natured objectives, based mostly in each the Western and growing world. As a part of the WHO-nominated 4,000 Meters Above Ache undertaking, for instance, a workforce are attempting to assist these recovering from melancholy, whereas a US shortlisted undertaking is searching for to stop women from being compelled into FGM in Tanzania.
Although the 3D Sierra Leone program was acknowledged by the Dutch Congress of Rehabilitation Medication two years in the past, its workforce would little doubt be delighted to win the WHO Particular Prize for his or her work as properly. The award’s winner will probably be determined by public vote, with individuals inspired to put up concerning the nominee they’d prefer to win beneath #Film4health, or remark beneath the undertaking’s video on YouTube.
Voting is predicted to shut on Could 10, 2022, with the winners set to be introduced in the course of the WHO’s Well being for All Movie Pageant in mid-Could.
Advancing prosthetic availability
For the reason that 3D Sierra Leone workforce kicked off their undertaking, numerous different teams of researchers have additionally used the innate manufacturing flexibility of 3D printing to drive the accessibility of prosthetic physique components. Mid-last 12 months, one other pupil at TU Delft managed to develop a low-cost upper-limb socket, which might be FDM 3D printed for as little as €30.
Prosthetic producer Partial Hand Options (PHS), alternatively, has begun utilizing Formlabs’ Kind 1 3D printer to create pediatric finger and elbow implants in-house. In doing so, the corporate says it’s now capable of produce extra sturdy nylon components cost-effectively, whereas chopping their lead instances down from two weeks to only a few days.
Away from the world of synthetic limbs, the know-how continues to be utilized within the creation of many different synthetic physique components too. The truth is, a workforce of researchers in Korea have even managed to develop 3D printed testicles, designed to fulfill a rising demand for low-cost prosthetics within the nation, and supply amputees with a well timed confidence enhance.
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