Leitat1 Reaches ICU patients as a Certified Campaign Respirator

First Clinical Test with a Campaign Respirator

The Leitat1 campaign respirator has proved to function correctly in the first tests carried out with ICU patients at Hospital Parc Taulí, to be extended immediately to several other hospitals in Catalonia.

 Con la aprobación de la Agencia Española del Medicamento, el objetivo actual es acelerar la producción y distribución del respirador antes del colapso de las urgencias médicas.

 In just over a week, the design of the first campaign respirator, Leitat 1, the result of the alliance between the Consorci de la Zona Franca (CZFB), HP and Leitat (Tecnio) together with CatSalut, through the Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa (CST) and the Hospital Parc Taulí in Sabadell has proved to be fully functional. The first tests carried out at the Hospital Parc Taulí on a patient affected by the COVID-19 virus corroborate it.

The respirator, designed by Leitat’s senior engineer, Mr. Magí Galindo, and medically validated by the team of Dr. Lluís Blanch, from Parc Taulí de Sabadell, an expert in mechanical ventilation, has been improved from the initial prototype with the incorporation of volumetric sensors, pressure sensors or oxygen alarms, among other aspects, to facilitate its use by healthcare personnel and guarantee its functionality for a longer period of time in assisted breathing for severe coronavirus patients. It has been renamed Leitat1.3

After the first satisfactory tests on human beings, the whole of Catalonia will carry out a clinical test starting imminently with several hospitals (Parc Taulí in Sabadell, Vall d’Hebrón, Hospital del Mar, Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa and Hospital General de Granollers) under the coordination of Dr. Ricard Ferrer (Dir. ICU Vall d’Hebrón), responsible of the unique ICU device in Catalonia.

For the approval of the Spanish Medicines’ Agency, several tests and optimizations have been carried out in Applus with Leitat´s technicians to guarantee the safety of the respirators and ensure that the Spanish Medicine’s Agency and Sanitary Products could finally certify the respirator and allow its use to contribute to avoid the collapse of the Spanish medical emergencies.

The respirator is robust and compact, made up of 3D parts printed with HP Multi Jet Fusion (MJF) technology and designed to be industrially scalable, in order to reach a production of 50 units per day at a cost 10 times lower than that of a conventional respirator.

Once the health authorities confirm their support, production will be accelerated- It will be concentrated and assembled in the facilities of the Fundación Cares. The pieces will be printed at the CZFB headquarters and the HP production teams, with the support of the 3D Factory Incubator and the 3D Hub (IAM3DHUB). The Bosch Siemens Home Appliance (BSH) company has also joined the project, and contacts are maintained with other companies such as Airbus with whom knowledge and technical capacities are being shared for the development of the project in what will end up being a new version of the respirator (Leitat2. 0).

The Leitat1 respirator (@respira_leitatX) has received different contributions from both citizens and companies (including those of Cellnex, Almirall and the Official College of Physicians of Barcelona- CoMB) and its promoters are coordinating different collaborating projects with other similar initiatives, both at a domestic and international level.