SIMETRI, INC. — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: AF203-CSO1

Description

The difference between life and death for the wounded warfighter is often the training the servicing Medic received before the battle began. Practicing life-saving skills in austere environments requires a human patient simulator rugged enough to survive transport to and within the zone, while having enough training features to justify the logistics. DoD and civilian medical training organizations can either buy a rugged, weighted manikin that is anatomically incorrect and offers no simulated physiology, or a “high fidelity” manikin that offers highly realistic physiology and scenarios through components that cannot be used in austere environments and require substantial, expensive sustainment before end of life. Medics sometimes try to bridge the gap between rugged and useful by “field engineering” features needed to practice a procedure, such as cutting out a piece of the torso and converting it to a reusable chest plate for Needle Chest Decompression. SIMETRI has identified a need for a configurable, mid-fidelity, rugged manikin that can be used in austere environments and provide increased training immersion without significantly increasing procurement and sustainment costs—productizing and commercializing the improvised systems used in the field.    SIMETRI will adapt a commercially available rugged, weighted manikin to provide the required functionality and durability at an affordable cost (and limited sustainment costs) by employing SIMETRI’s technology and techniques of rapidly prototyping, manufacturing, testing, and fielding medical training technologies to fill a training gap identified by medical training personnel across the USAF and DoD.    AF Strategic Priority TA-004 calls for innovative solutions in the area of Human Performance, including Medical Technologies, specifically including rapid emergency medical response and trauma management, human capabilities including training, and decision-making. SIMETRI will apply its proven methodology to commercialize medical training products to develop a ruggedized, mid-fidelity medical manikin to meet an urgent rapid emergency medical response and trauma management training need. SIMETRI’s Durable Advanced Simulated Homologue (DASH) is a medical manikin designed to train and maintain Medics’ proficiency on the Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) Program Of Instruction, yet be rugged enough to be transported and used anywhere. DASH is a ruggedized, mid-fidelity homologue patient simulator that is affordable, extendable, and easy to maintain. TCCC and clinical training frequently provided by military and civilian practitioners require rugged, immersive, and easy to maintain training devices with low sustainment costs—training devices are in high demand and SIMETRI has successfully developed and sold commercially the required training modules required for DASH, such as amputated limbs for training hemorrhage management and torso inserts for abdominal wound packing.