Luis Cordoba’s son, Luis Fernando Cordoba Martinez, was born at the end of September of this year and was subsequently diagnosed with early asthma —likely inherited from his father.
Asthma is a common, and increasing, childhood disease that can be managed, however it is also distressing and can prove life-threatening particularly for young children and infants if not managed correctly. Typically, asthmatic young children and infants are prescribed with salbutamol, which is delivered in spray mist form via a nebulizer.
However, as Luis Sr discovered, while children’s nebulizers can be purchased off-the-shelf, they come in standard sizes unlike the children they are meant for. Insert Image Screen Shot 2013-12-15 at 07.12.52 In Luis Jr’s case, the standard purchased mask did not cover his face properly and much of the asthma drug was lost during administration, which meant he wasn’t getting the correct dosages.
With a Bachelors degree in Industrial Design from the Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro in Mexico, where Luis lives, this Dad knew he could come up with something more suitable for his son. And he designed and 3D printed a customized mask that would fit his son’s face more precisely.
The images below illustrate the design process that Luis undertook and the subsequent, optimized design was 3D printed on an Ultimaker using 20 g of PLA material. It took three hours to print and after clean-up and post-processing, Luis Sr reports that the mask proved to be much more effective for the delivery of Luis Jr’s medicine, allowing him to “finish his first treatment correctly and be a healthy child.”
Luis has made the design available here.
