The unmet clinical need I identified was ultimately chosen to be our project focus for the course. The next major step in our design process was to create several low resolution prototypes of possible solutions to this issue. For my prototype, I aimed to mimic the common practice of blowing into the opening of to inflate, which, evident from the survey data, is employed frequently by medical professionals. To recreate this, I attached a simple kitchen funnel to a can of compressed air. To operate the prototype, a glove would be stretched over the funnel and the funnel would be pushed down, which in turn activated the compressed air and the glove would inflate.

This prototype proved to be the most effective preliminary solution. At this point, our design team got to work refining the design. This included 3D printing several versions of our modified funnel design, as well as brainstorming ways to make our solution more environmentally friendly and cost effective. Although the compressed air canister worked well, we discovered it only lasted about fifty uses before needing replacement. To combat this, the design team devised a solution that will utilize a linear actuator and a syringe to compress the air and inflate the glove.

Construction of our final prototype took several months and was followed by verification and validation testing. V&V testing involved various aspects of design functionality and safety such as noise output and rip evaluation. All tests were successful. I presented our project at the ASAIOfyi Student Design Competition in Washington D.C. and was awarded First Place.