The breathe ventilator in Ghana and Kenya

We recently had the chance to visit Ghana and Kenya together with our latest ventilator prototype. Milena and Thomas from our team met with doctors, engineers, technicians, and medical device distributors to collect feedback, discuss ideas, and learn more about potential users and markets for the breathe ventilator.

The breathe ventilator in an ambulance in Kenya

The first stop in Ghana was the capital Accra, the biggest city in the country and located on the southern coast at the Gulf of Guinea. Bringing along our ventilator prototype, we visited several hospitals in the city and talked to doctors and nurses, as well as biomedical engineers and technicians who are responsible for servicing and maintaining the medical devices in the hospitals. In addition to getting the medical functionalities right, understanding the role of service and maintenance is crucial for designing a device that will be used in challenging environments.

We also used the opportunity to visit Ashesi University that offers a collaborative master’s program in mechatronics together with ETH Zurich. It was great to meet all the creative and dedicated students and after many inspiring discussions, we wouldn’t be surprised if the next innovation would be coming from Ashesi. The final stop in Ghana was the Accra Impact Hub where we got an insight into the Ghanaian start-up scene and met entrepreneurs from all over the world.

Discussing our ventilator design with students at Ashesi University

Our next stop was Kenya’s capital Nairobi, a vibrant city and the economic center of the country. To understand the role of rural health care facilities in the Kenyan health care system and with the help of our colleagues at CPHD, we visited several hospitals of different size in both remote and urban areas in and around Nairobi and Kisumu. We also met with our colleagues from Hatch Technologies, who are experts in health care solutions in Sub-Saharan Africa. At the end of our trip, we visited several distributors of medical devices in Kenya, giving us an insight into the regulatory and business landscape in Kenya’s medical device sector.

Showing the breathe ventilator to ICU nurses

Overall, we were able to show our ventilator to many people with all different backgrounds and received a lot of valuable and positive feedback! Thanks to everyone who made this trip possible, especially to ETH4D, SASBI Program by Uni Basel and Venturelab, BRIDGE, Alex Quaisie from Verifie health, Wilfred Elegba, Nathan Amanquah, CPHD, Bernard Olayo, Gatwiri Murithi, Bernhards Ogutu, Dick Oranja from Hatch Technologies, and many others.