Medical Suction

The Challenge

There is a lack of medical suction and fluid containment capability for chest tube and airway management in partial gravity and microgravity environments.

The Progress

NASA GRC leveraged fluid physics expertise to demonstrate a technology proof of concept to contain and separate bio-fluid constituents in reduced gravity.

Current development includes developing requirements and concept of operations for the Medical Suction Patient Interface (MSPI). This will provide the interface information for relevant subsystems, including the patient, caregiver, vehicle generated vacuum, separation, and medical system. The planned multifaceted interface will include:

– Patient to MSPI interface comprised of tubes and tips to perform dental, gastric, and pulmonary suction

– Caregiver to MSPI interface to provide the ability to vary the vacuum level and keep a log of that level as a function of time

– Vehicle to MSPI interface comprised of the vacuum forcing function, health and status data for the separator, and a log of caregiver-selected treatment variables as a function of time

– Medical System to MSPI interface comprised of sensor data from the patien and command data selected by the caregiver as inputs to record in both the patient medical history file and any automated clinical decision support tools