Volume Control of Low-Cost Ventilator with Automatic Set-Point Adaptation

This paper considers the control design for a low-cost ventilator that is based on a manual resuscitator bag (also known as AmbuBag) to pump air into the lungs of a patient who is physically unable to breathe. First, it experimentally shows that for accurately tracking tidal volumes, the controller needs to adjust to the individual patient and the different configurations, e.g., hardware or operation modes. Second, it proposes a set-point adaptation algorithm that uses sensor measurements of a flow meter to automatically adapt the controller to the setup at hand. Third, it shows in experiments on a mechanical lung simulator that such an adaptive solution improves the performance of the ventilator for various setups. One objective of this paper is to increase awareness of the need for feedback control using flow measurements in low-cost ventilator solutions in order to automatically adapt to the specific scenario.