Kangaroo Transport of premature babies

Kangaroo Transport of premature babies

De Groot, J.M.

Goossens, R.H.M. (mentor)
Jepma, E.J. (mentor)
Willemsen, H. (mentor)

Industrial Design Engineering

Industrial Design

Master of Science Integrated Product Design

2014-10-10

This graduation report comprises a study on the feasibility of Kangaroo Transport of premature babies by ambulance, which was initiated by BabyBloom Healthcare. BabyBloom Healthcare is a company that specializes in creating child-, parent- and nurse friendly products for neonatology departments. This study results in a design proposal and a future vision for a new product that encompasses these values. Babies are supposed to be born at gestational age of 40 weeks, however 7.3% of all babies born in the Netherlands is born premature, which means before 37 weeks. At the moment babies can survive increasingly early and the threshold to start medical support is 24 weeks of gestation. Premature babies can be placed in an incubator to allow them to grow in a safe and controlled environment. Premature babies are often transported to other hospitals inside a transport incubator at least once during their hospital period. Transport can have several reasons such as capacity issues or the need for certain specialisms. Two major concerns of incubator transport are: Traffic safety. The baby is often transported without being restrained, which creates an unsafe situation in case of a car crash. Stress. The baby is often getting stressed due to high amount of vibrations, light, sounds, and transfers from and to different incubators. Kangaroo Care is a well-known technique within the neonatology in which a baby is placed skin-to-skin on the bare chest of the parent. The benefits for both baby and parent have been studied and confirmed. The most important effects are regulation of temperature, stabilization of heart and respiration rate and stimulation of bonding between baby and parent. Five sections structure the report. First, an extensive analysis was executed to understand the ambulance service and neonatal context including the associated stakeholders. A literature and qualitative study was performed comprising observations and non-structured interviews. Parents were interviewed and several hospitals and ambulance services were visited. Kangaroo Care and the use of Kangaroo Transport were also analyzed. Kangaroo Care at the hospital was often perceived as very convenient by parents, which resulted in the following design vision: “Kangaroo Transport should be experienced as Kangaroo Care in the hospital”. The decision was made to design for Intensive Care (IC) transport on a foldable ambulance stretcher, which was considered as the most challenging direction. To enable Kangaroo Transport two elements are required. The “Womb” fixates parent and baby, and the “Medical Equipment System” (MES) enables medical care during transport. The ideation section comprises brainstorm sessions that resulted in three idea directions of the Womb. The most promising one, the safety belt idea was chosen for further development. A creative session with nurses was performed to validate MES ideas and one concept was chosen. An iterative process was used at the development section to elaborate the Womb and MES. The idea direction became a concept, which was then immediately tested with a first prototype. The MES was also becoming more detailed in this phase, however, it has been decided that the main focus is the Womb since this future product is more interesting for BabyBloom Healthcare. The design proposal section includes the final result of the design process containing the BabyBloom Womb and the Kangaroo Transport stretcher (KTS). The BabyBloom Womb consists of a harness worn by the parent and a pouch in which the premature baby is readied. The baby can be placed on the retractable plateau of the KTS in case resuscitation, which is one of the three new-to-design accessories of the final KTS proposal. A prototype of the Womb was made to validate the proposal with stakeholders and to obtain a better understanding of the traffic safety. At last, the evaluation section consists of verification by the program of requirements and validation by user testing. The tests resulted in a future implementation plan and several design recommendations. Based on the positive feedback of several stakeholders, it can be concluded that Kangaroo Transport is feasible and can replace Incubator Transport. The baby is expected to experience less stress when moved with Kangaroo Transport and is more secure than before.

Kangaroo Transport
Neonatal Transport
Premature babies
Incubator Transport
Ambulance

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:5817f57e-d344-4bbe-ba42-657bf3b2d4de

2015-10-10

Campus only

Student theses

master thesis

(c) 2014 De Groot, J.M.