Passive Airflow Systems for Healthcare Isolation Rooms in Haiti
ENGS 89/90 - Engineering Design Methodology and Project Initiation/Completion
For this project, I worked in a team of six with the ultimate goal of completing a project sponsored by Build Health International (BHI), a non-profit organization. The deliverables included: (1) Research analysis on Haiti airflow conditions and general air change requirements in healthcare settings and (2) System design (CAD, scale model, etc.) of a passive airflow system and/or improved
building design that considers conditions in Haiti. After extensive research and experimentation, our team had to make the ethical decision of informing our sponsor that a completely passive (without the aid of a mechanical fail-safe) airflow system, in the location they specified, could not be attained with a consistently responsible and safe result. Consequently, we moved to change the title of our project to Optimization of Airflow in Isolation Rooms.
Our final abstract came to be:
ENGS 89/90 Group 15 worked with Build Health International (BHI). BHI’s hospitals in Haiti
currently use exhaust fans to ventilate infectious disease isolation rooms. It is difficult and
expensive to repair these fans, putting people at risk. BHI tasked our group with creating a
design guide of alternative ventilation strategies that they can reference when laying out future
hospitals in under-resourced nations. Our guide provides solutions that prevent the spread of
airborne disease by designing rooms that rely on minimal mechanical elements such as, provide
a cooling effect, stay within the current cost of construction, and are feasible to construct in
Haiti.
MILESTONES
- White Paper: early-phase project research and specification of design requirements
- Preliminary Design Review: demonstration that the correct design options have been selected and verification methods are in place
- Critical Design Review: defend team solution for the project deliverable and provide confidence that the final design will succeed in meeting the project goal and objectives
- Final Design Review: evaluation of the quality of work and the acceptability of the design in meeting the project requirements and design specifications
SKILLS DEVELOPED
- Intellectual Property: learned to understand what it is and how to work with it
- Literature Review: learned how to effectively communicate information among group members and how to deliver new insight
- Autodesk CFD: used this software to analyze fluid mechanics and to draw conclusions
- Documentation: learned to preserve vital information in a manner most effective for communication and review
- Sponsorship and Collaboration: learned the importance of teamwork and individual contribution
- Cost Analysis: learned the importance of resource-limitation and being mindful of cost
- SolidWorks: learned how to combine the CAD models of this software with the tools and properties of other software
- Ethics: learned the importance of ethical principles
- Legal System: learned the role of the legal system in engineering
REFLECTION
Much of the work I conducted included significant amounts of design work, CAD modelling, documentation, technical writing, and research that remains private for the time being. This was an incredible experience in which I addressed real-world problems and challenged myself to think in a multi-faceted manner.
