Medical Device Innovation

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected more than 20 million people worldwide with a death toll of over 700 thousand. Although HFNO and NIPPV are effective in treating severe COVID-19 patients, high-cost of these devices make it impossible to procure sufficient amounts of such ventilation devices in low and middle income countries.

We propose OxyJet CPAP, a low-cost NIPPV system that is easy to use, manufacture, and implement within an LMIC healthcare infrastructure.

Vaccine safety and effectiveness rely on strict temperature control during transport. In low- and middle-income countries like Bangladesh, vaccines are often delivered using ice-packed cold boxes, but inadequate temperature monitoring risks unnoticed excursions that compromise quality. Current reliance on expensive, imported monitoring equipment adds cost and limits local solutions.

Our lab develops compact, IoT-based wireless sensor systems specifically for resource-constrained vaccine cold chains. These systems track temperature in real-time, providing remote monitoring and alerts. Our long-term goal is to strengthen reliable, locally-developed immunization programs by reducing dependence on imported technology.

Our lab works on adapting bubble continuous positive airway pressure (Bubble CPAP) into a practical, affordable respiratory support solution for adults in resource-limited hospitals. Building on earlier success using Bubble CPAP in children, we study how this simple non-invasive technology can be redesigned and introduced for adults with severe pneumonia, hypoxemia, and related respiratory distress. Our research focuses not only on whether the therapy can improve oxygenation safely, but also on whether it can be realistically used in busy hospital settings where equipment, staffing, and training may be limited.

To do this, we combine clinical evaluation with real-world implementation research, identifying the design, workflow, and training barriers that affect successful adoption at the bedside. This includes improving patient interfaces, ensuring reliable bubbling and pressure delivery, supporting routine monitoring, and understanding how clinicians and patients experience the therapy in practice. Overall, our work aims to make adult Bubble CPAP a low-cost, scalable alternative to more expensive forms of non-invasive ventilatory support.

Continuous ECG monitoring is an essential tool for Cardiovascular Disease patients but in low resource countries, continuous monitoring of ECG has become a challenge due to limited availability of ECG system, high prices and lack of skilled physicians. We present a low-cost, low-power and wireless Flexible fabric-based design of ECG monitoring system with cloud-based automatic arrhythmia detection using Convolutional Neural Network.

Diet monitoring is crucial for diseases such as: diabetes, obesity, eating disorders, hypertension. Automatic monitoring is more effective and accurate than manual count of intake. We developed a fabric-based low-cost ($5) wearable neckband that monitors user’s eating and drinking activities.