Project developed with a team at OtherLab in San Francisco.

The current Covid19 pandemic is a global challenge with exponential outbreaks that are overwhelming healthcare infrastructure.

Patient segmentation, housing, and containment on the frontline is often ad-hoc.

OtherLab has developed a solution that can be manufactured and deployed immediately.

The unit consists of a polymer film tent deployed inside of an existing hospital room, converting a standard bed into a stand-alone isolation unit with negative pressure. The tent includes glove walls and pass-throughs for ventilation tubes, food, waste, and telemetry cables. It also includes a “hug wall” for physically moving or assisting a patient, as well as donning and doffing rooms for safe access through disinfection protocols.

Similar isolation units cost tens of thousands of dollars and are not rapidly deployable.

Our approach is a medically vetted, deployable, disposable and mass manufacturable product that is a critically enabling technology for the current COVID-19 threat.

Where existing solutions tend to rely on hazmat suits—suits with a high potential for user error and thus infection—the Care Cube inverts the whole model. Focusing on containing the patient allows for the vast majority of caregiver interactions to happen safely from outside. The “hug wall” isn’t just for giving hugs, it gives medical personnel protected access to the patient and the entire interior of the cube, making simple medical procedures like checking vitals possible without the need for suit changes. An air lock system with two-stage zippered entrances allow food and other items to be safely passed into the Cube, as well as waste to be safely passed out. A fan circulates fresh air, while a HEPA filter removes the virus before air leaves the tent.

Learn more at carecubes.com