Clabsi

Principal Investigator: Hanmin Lee, MD
Team Members: Mohammad Karimzada, Kaelan Schorger, Sachin Rangarajan

Challenge

Catheter related infections affect millions of patients worldwide both in-hospitals and at-home. These infections are especially lethal to pediatric patients with long term catheters; over time, each infection blocks one of a limited number of access points with which to give life sustaining IV nutrition. For adults, these recurrent infections represent a serious danger to health and well being, and are a frequent cause of mortality.

Solution

Our solution is to use electric current to disrupt biofilm formation, thereby preventing bacterial infection of the catheter. Our intended design implements segmental current applied via conductive metal (copper for prototyping with eventual plans for titanium, a metal used for permanent implants), at the proximal mid and distal lengths of a catheter.