To understand and mitigate infant patient vibration exposure during emergency ground and air transport

每年，加拿大数以千计的新生儿被空运或地面救护车运送到 接受专门的医疗护理。这些婴儿通常是早产儿，特别容易受到伤害。 在运输过程中。在运输过程中暴露于振动可能会增加严重的长期风险 后果包括脑损伤。减少运输过程中的风险，专用设备 使用的是。然而，婴儿经历的振动水平和影响因素并不是很好。 明白了。这种知识的缺乏影响了将新生儿运送到医院的能力 最安全的方式。 我们的目标是通过减少振动暴露来提高婴儿运输的安全性。我们 提出一项研究计划，试图了解道路振动是如何 空气环境被转移到婴儿身上。这将使我们能够提出新的方法 为了减少振动暴露，改进运送脆弱婴儿的设备。我们 将测量许多交通场景中的振动，包括医院内以及 地面救护车、直升机和飞机。测试结果将用于开发测试 运输设备和评估运输设备的程序。这项研究将使 更好地了解问题并提供可靠的方法来测试传输 设备和程序。这将导致新的工具来规划路线，最大限度地减少振动 并用于监测病人的振动。 我们的研究汇集了儿科和工程学的专业知识，以研究新的解决方案 来解决这个问题。该团队包括来自卡尔顿大学的工程师和来自 大型儿童医院(渥太华CHEO，多伦多SickKids)。医生们代表着一个 省委负责提供改善安全的意见和建议， 护理质量，以及患者和家属的体验。此次协作将确保 结果被传达给临床医生，他们可以产生积极的变化。

Each year, thousands of newborns in Canada are transported by air or ground ambulance to receive specialized medical care. These infants are often premature and especially vulnerable during transport. Vibration exposure during transport may contribute risk of serious long-term consequences including brain injury. To decease risk during transport, specialized equipment is used. However, vibration levels experienced by infants and contributing factors are not well understood. This lack of knowledge affects the ability to transport newborn patients in the safest manner possible. Our goal is to increase the safety of infant transport by reducing vibration exposure. We propose a research program which seeks to understand how vibrations caused by the road and air environments are transferred to the infant. This will allow us to propose novel methods to reduce vibration exposure and improve the equipment for transporting fragile infants. We will measure vibrations in many transport scenarios including within hospitals as well as in ground ambulances, helicopters, and airplanes. The results will be used to develop test equipment and procedures for evaluating the transport equipment. This research will enable better understanding of the problem and provide a reliable way to test the transport equipment and procedures. It will lead to new tools for planning routes that minimize vibration and for monitoring patient vibration. Our research brings together expertise in pediatrics and engineering to study novel solutions to this problem. The team includes engineers from Carleton University and physicians from large childrens hospitals (CHEO in Ottawa, SickKids in Toronto). The physicians represent a provincial committee tasked with providing advice and recommendations to improve safety, quality of care, and the patients and familys experience. This collaboration will ensure that the results are communicated to the clinicians who can impact positive change.