Dräger has announced FDA clearance for its Seattle Positive Airway Pressure (PAP) plus system. Developed by Seattle Children’s Research Institute and produced and marketed by Dräger, the Seattle PAP plus leverages Bubble Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) technology and further improves upon it to make it easier for premature infants with respiratory distress to breathe.
Worldwide, nearly 1 million infants die annually from respiratory distress syndrome. In the U.S. alone, there are approximately 18,000 hospitalizations each year due to RDS at a cost of approximately $2.3 billion.
Although Bubble CPAP has been a treatment option for neonates for more than 40 years, there has always been a desire to further reduce the work of breathing for these patients and increase the safety of the therapy. Historically, a major complication of Bubble CPAP in preemies is respiratory muscle exhaustion, where the baby’s respiratory muscles wear out, which can result in respiratory failure.
The design of the Seattle PAP plus addresses both of these concerns. The 135-degree angle of the bubbler increases the oscillations with the goal of offering more efficient respiratory support, lessening the work required by respiratory muscles and making it easier for babies to breathe. The second design difference is the locking mechanism for the pressure level, which avoids inadvertent changes of CPAP level and increases safety of the therapy delivered.
“Seattle Children’s Research Institute wanted a better option for treating respiratory distress in premature babies so we worked with them to bring a solution to the market that addresses a previously unmet need in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU),” said Steve Menet, senior vice president of sales, hospital solutions, Draeger, Inc, in a press release. “This is a great example of how healthcare industry stakeholders can come together to address a clinical need to improve patient outcomes.”
The Seattle PAP plus is effective, safe and easy to use:
Efficacy: The patented design is totally focused on the infant’s clinical needs, enabling the clinician to:
· Easily adjust CPAP from 4.5 to 10 cm H2O
· Quickly connect the Seattle PAP plus system to the appropriate BabyFlow plus patient interface
· Treat patients with the needed masks and prongs in combination with BabyFlow plus
Safety: The system incorporates safety features to avoid inadvertent changes in the position of the tube and subsequent changes in CPAP levels, which can cause serious harm to the infant. To eliminate the risk of cross-contamination, all system components are single-patient use.
Ease of use: A single kit provides all the parts needed to assemble the Seattle PAP plus therapy, allowing the caregiver to worry less about assembly and more about the patient.
