On Apr. 24, 2020, OHSU announced that a research team led by Albert Chi, M.D., M.S.E., an OHSU trauma surgeon, has developed a low-cost ventilator that can be widely produced with 3D-printing technology. Chi previously pioneered 3D-printed prosthetics for children.

The ventilator design doesnﾒt require electricity, only the type of standard oxygen tank broadly available at hospitals and clinics worldwide. Depending on the printer, a single ventilator can be manufactured within three to eight hours and made operational with the addition of low-cost springs. The design would be used in triage situations when clinicians must make life-or-death decisions about which patients are intubated with ventilators to give them a chance of survival.