Printed on a 3D printer plot of the trachea saves lives for children

3D printers are now used in many areas - from the aerospace industry to the production of simple toys. Doctors also work with these systems - on Geektimes news and articles about how to use 3D printers in medicine have been published more than once. The other day there was information about another way of using such systems: doctors print out a trachea section on a printer, which can change shape at the same time as a child grows.

At the moment, this technology has already saved the lives of 3 babies who have had problems with the airways. Moreover, these problems threatened the lives of children. The technology of creating parts that can grow with the child’s body is another important achievement in medicine.

The first child received such an implant three years ago, and a piece of plastic helped the little man to recover. We are talking about a type of tracheal bronchomalacia - a relatively rare disease that leads to the collapse of the respiratory tract and, consequently, to the death of the child. This disease is observed in 1 out of 2000 children. Children usually outgrow the disease, reaching three years of age. But in serious cases up to three years, the child simply does not live.
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By the way, the only reason for which the parents of the children agreed to the participation of their offspring in a medical experiment is the lack of other ways to prevent the child from smothering. No therapy or medication helped. One child not only could not breathe normally, but was also not able to eat food. If it were not for the doctors, the baby would have died in a few days.


This is how it works (Morrison et al. Science Translation Medicine)

In order to create an implant, the researchers carefully studied the images of the trachea of ​​patients, followed by modeling the required area. Here, special software was used that is capable of generating a tracheal model, based on the structure of the patient’s airways.

The implant itself was created using laser sintering technology, and it took 1-3 days to create an implant. The cost of the material is very low, $ 10 per implant.


Morrison et al. Science Translation Medicine (2015)

Since the implant is not closed, it is able to expand as the child grows. Doctors were worried that if this did not happen, the child’s airways could not normally increase in size. But everything turned out well - the plastic made the trachea expand as the child grew. All three operations completed successfully.