Maingear Uses PC Building Tech to Produce Low-Cost Ventilators
It turns out a PC desktop tower also makes a pretty good ventilator.
On Wednesday, custom PC vendor Maingear said it was responding to the coronavirus pandemic by building its own ventilators. The result is the Liv, an emergency pulmonary ventilator the company wants supply to hospitals in New York and across the world.
Maingear is best known for building custom PC desktops and laptops. But now the vendor is proposing to use its manufacturing facilities in New Jersey to churn out the Liv, which it says “can be produced at scale for approximately a quarter of the price of traditional ventilators.”
“It’s one of the advantages of being a small, nimble, and a high-energy business,” Maingear CEO Wallace Santos told PCMag in an email. “We used off-the-shelf parts, including a computer chassis for the working prototype.” He says a single unit will cost around $7,000.
The machine itself promises to be easy to use, thanks to a touch-screen tablet and preset configurations that untrained users will be able to understand. The same machine is also outfitted with redundant power circuits, safety features, and the ability to drain and collect virus-carrying exhales from the patient’s lungs during the treatment process.
The Liv was built with the input from a medical advisory board, which Maingear assembled about two weeks ago. As for the ventilator technology itself, Maingear relied on designs currently being used in Italy and Switzerland to respond to the pandemic.
“The Maingear LIV Emergency Pulmonary Ventilator is designed to work safely even in the event that all sensors fail,” the company added. “The device is designed for critically ill and intubated patients (patients undergoing intensive therapy), offering fully automated operation with or without a breath trigger.”
Now the New Jersey-based Maingear is seeking to secure approval from the FDA so that it can begin supplying the ventilators to local hospitals. “Once the production chassis is complete and emergency FDA approval is in place, we’ll be able to produce as many as 200 to 300 units per day,” Wallace added. “Pending FDA approval, we can possibly start production as soon as two weeks from now.”
In the meantime, the company is trying to build awareness for the ventilator with the hopes of shipping units to hospitals in need worldwide. Interested medical providers can contact Maingear at the dedicated Liv website.
