Friday was certainly a good day! Taking half of the day to shop for some parts, it turned out to be a huge success. Finally, after hanging out in the preemie room for so long, I decided that for our secondary project we should try to make a new set of bililights for them! For those of you who don’t know, bili is short for bilirubin, the natural product in the breakdown of heme. It is very common in the first days of a newborns life to have much higher levels of bilirubin because their body is not developed fully to break it down to its proper level- causing the yellow tint on a baby’s skin. This being said, in premature babies and those with a low birth weight, it is even more common to have higher levels which is why in this department, the lights are vital. I had e-mailed our trainer, Larry, as well as a Rice University student who I had read an article about to see if we could get any tips about how to go about building one of our own. After getting great responses from both (thanks!), Soren and I decided that it was in fact something we could try and do.
We kept our shopping list short to tubing, a fitting for pumping up wheel chair tires, and blue led lights. We first went around looking for some tubing and the right fitting to be able to use our compressor as a tire pump. It was quite hard trying to communicate about the specifications with the tubing but we ended up getting the right size and everything. The great part is if the store doesn’t have what you need, they usually have a pretty good idea of where to get it. We searched around asking about 7 different light/electrical shops about blue led lights for our phototherapy project, we somehow got unbelievably lucky. In a light shop, finally after about 15 minutes of explaining what kind of lights we were looking for, the owner suddenly said that he actually had a new product that came in several different led colors. In the store he only had red, but was really interested in our project and wanted to show us what they looked like. Hooking the lights up to a car battery (since there was no electricity) the lights lit up a ridiculously bright red. It just so happened that he knew that in Dar Es Salaam he had them in a variety of colors, including blue! Why blue to begin with? The wavelength that blue light emits is around 450-490 nm, proven to be around the optimal level that helps to break down bilirubin. The owner, Mustafa, then said that if we ordered it today, that he could get it to us no later than Tuesday. With this as our best shot, we went for it and put a down payment of 30,000 shillings. The product is normally used for decoration and is waterproof because it’s commonly used in pools- which will help with its durability and cleanliness for the hospital. Five meters in length and 300 LED’s we figured we couldn’t go wrong! It was quite a relief to have our project set and the possibility of a great success. When we returned to the hospital we put our tubing and fitting onto the compressor and it worked like a gem, and super fast. Then we got called in yet again to the surgical theatre for two more devices to look at: a suction pump that was brand new but wouldn’t work and a drill that our favorite Korean doctor thought he’d maybe jammed after pushing into some bone to hard. We ended up staying at the hospital until 5:30 just trying to open both and agreed to continue with them on Monday.
We kept our shopping list short to tubing, a fitting for pumping up wheel chair tires, and blue led lights. We first went around looking for some tubing and the right fitting to be able to use our compressor as a tire pump. It was quite hard trying to communicate about the specifications with the tubing but we ended up getting the right size and everything. The great part is if the store doesn’t have what you need, they usually have a pretty good idea of where to get it. We searched around asking about 7 different light/electrical shops about blue led lights for our phototherapy project, we somehow got unbelievably lucky. In a light shop, finally after about 15 minutes of explaining what kind of lights we were looking for, the owner suddenly said that he actually had a new product that came in several different led colors. In the store he only had red, but was really interested in our project and wanted to show us what they looked like. Hooking the lights up to a car battery (since there was no electricity) the lights lit up a ridiculously bright red. It just so happened that he knew that in Dar Es Salaam he had them in a variety of colors, including blue! Why blue to begin with? The wavelength that blue light emits is around 450-490 nm, proven to be around the optimal level that helps to break down bilirubin. The owner, Mustafa, then said that if we ordered it today, that he could get it to us no later than Tuesday. With this as our best shot, we went for it and put a down payment of 30,000 shillings. The product is normally used for decoration and is waterproof because it’s commonly used in pools- which will help with its durability and cleanliness for the hospital. Five meters in length and 300 LED’s we figured we couldn’t go wrong! It was quite a relief to have our project set and the possibility of a great success. When we returned to the hospital we put our tubing and fitting onto the compressor and it worked like a gem, and super fast. Then we got called in yet again to the surgical theatre for two more devices to look at: a suction pump that was brand new but wouldn’t work and a drill that our favorite Korean doctor thought he’d maybe jammed after pushing into some bone to hard. We ended up staying at the hospital until 5:30 just trying to open both and agreed to continue with them on Monday.
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