3/29 Lamp Update

Today's meeting was just a planning meeting. Next week we will begin work on the second lamp head.

Assignments for the week:
Steve: buy metal strips, a switch, and sticky squares
Elliot: buy cell phone batteries
Melissa: pick out LEDs
Liz: Talk to BlueLab about the generator (probably by emailing the officers)
Dan: Talk to CGH about people to interview about the lamp, talk to Aileen (aileenhs@umich.edu) about getting into contact with Frank Andersen and other MDs.

Here's a tentative schedule for the next two months:
4/5: Start working on lamp head #2, wire up the cell phone batteries
4/12: Finish lamp head #2
4/19: Finals, probably no meeting
4/26: Make contact with UM surgeons to give us feedback on the lamp, work on getting the lamp to run off wall power
5/3: Finish getting the lamp to run off wall power
5/10: Internal testing
5/17: External testing with UM surgeons
5/24: Make modifications as recommended by the surgeons
Early June: send lamp to Nicaragua

Here's two links to the surgical lamp that won the Australian design award:
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/newinventors/txt/s3158339.htm
http://student.designawards.com.au/application_detail.jsp?status=3&applicationID=9657


Because I forgot to send them out last week, here are the interview questions:
1. Have you seen a need for improved surgical lighting?
2. Is the need sporadic or constant? What is the cause of the need? If sporatic, how long and how often?
3. Where does surgical lighting rank in the list of priorities?
4. How much do you think clinics/hospitals would be willing to spend on a grid-independent surgical lamp?
5. Have you witnessed a surgery that had to be stopped due to inadequate surgical lighting? What was the result?
6. What manufacturing capabilities are available?
7. What batteries are locally available? LEDs? Used bike parks? Cost?
8. How often does the power go out for? For how long?
9. What are the most common procedures requiring surgical lamps? Where are they performed?
10. Do you see the lamp being used for anything other than surgery?
11. What is currently being used for surgical lighting? What about during blackouts? How well does this work?
12. Do you think a grid-independent surgical lamp would be a cost-effective way to improve the quality of care?
13. How important is portability for surgical lighting?
14. Are you interested in helped us to design/implement a surgical lamp?
15. What other equipment/supplies are needed for surgical lamps to be useful? Anesthesia? Disposables?
16. Do you have any questions or comments? Are there any questions that you think we should have asked that we didn’t?