A positive ringing sound began at 5 pm last Sunday as the nation came out their windows to acknowledge the efforts of every doctor and worker helping fight the pandemic Covid-19.
For doctors and health workers it is particularly difficult since they have to be in close contact with infected persons to treat them. They have been putting their lives at risk to be there and provide as much help as their profession allows them to.
To provide maximum support to them, this Mumbai based startup called Boson Machines has been working on printing 3D face shields for doctors and health workers, as reported by The Indian Express.
The startup was approached by Jaslok hospital and they got into production just 5 days back. Parth Panchal, who began Boson Machines in 2017 along with Arjun Panchal, told Indian Express that the duo went to the hospital for 3 days, they worked on 3-4 iterations of the design and sat with 5-8 doctors to fix the design of face shields as recommended by them.
After this, the startup began production of 20-30 3D face shields for the doctors and health workers.
What makes these 3D shields different from N95 masks is that they cover the entire face. A mask only manages to cover the nose and mouth while a 3D shield covers the whole face including ears. Since doctors work in such close proximity to the infected, their face needs to be covered all over to reduce the chance of getting infected.
The founders, however, clarify that this shield is not a replacement for masks, it is an extra layer of protection. These kinds of shields are used worldwide but their effectiveness is not guaranteed. At the moment, 3D face shields are being used by doctors only for one patient which are thrown away and are sterlised by autoclaving.
Panchals’ factory is set up in Goregaon, Mumbai where they are working round the clock to meet the demand of 3D face shields. They receive their orders via WhatsApp and other social media channels putting all their 40 3D printers into work. They have also collaborated with some colleges that own 3D printers to help them out.
Parth points out in an interaction with the Indian Express that 3D printing has the advantage of one person handling 20 machines at the same time and each machine being able to print the product overnight without monitoring. He also says that a lot of government agencies and hospitals have been displaying an interest in face shields. Some of them are KEM Hospital, Mumbai Police, Customs Department, Kasturba Hospital and more from Jaipur, Bangalore, Pune, and Bihar.