Throughout history, humanity has been plagued by a myriad of humanitarian crises that seemingly take the form of perpetual human suffering. Today, approximately 125,000,000 people require humanitarian assistance as the result of famine, war, geopolitical conflict, and natural disasters. A core component of this suffering is afflictions related to human health, where disturbances strain or overwhelm the existing healthcare infrastructure to create the conditions for an increase in morbidities and co-morbidities. One of the more startling elements is the loss of life to preventable medical conditions that were not properly treated or even diagnosed in the field, and is often due to the limited interventional capacity that medical teams and humanitarian practitioners have in these scenarios. These individuals are often hindered by medical equipment deficiencies or devices not meant to function in austere conditions. The development of highly versatile, feasible, and cost-effective medical devices and technologies that can be deployed in the field is essential to enhancing medical care in unconventional settings. In this book we examine the nature of the creative problem-solving paradigm, and dissect the intersection of frugal, disruptive, open, and reverse innovation processes in advancing humanitarian medicine. Specifically, we examine the feasible deployment of these devices and technologies in unconventional environments not only by humanitarian aid and disaster relief agencies, but also by crisis-affected communities themselves. The challenge is complex, but the financial support and technical development of innovative solutions for the delivery of humanitarian aid is a process in which everyone is a stakeholder.

In this book, Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa and a region in the lowest income group per capita, is used to demonstrate the potential for healthcare reorganization and collaboration with the introduction of "successful" technologies centered around available, bio-compatible, and sustainable natural resources. Our book discusses three of the top killers of children under 5 years of age in Nigeria, pneumonia (20%), diarrheal diseases (15%), and traumatic injuries (4%). These conditions are used as examples to demonstrate the potential for improved pediatric outcomes with treatments engineered from sustainable and natural resources. Furthermore, this book outlines possible action items that can help drive economic growth, educational opportunities, collaborative outreach, and workforce productivity to build a healthy and sustainable community. Medical technology in the industrialized world has seen rapid advancements leading to increased survival and greater patient outcomes. However, the development and implementation of these resources is not always applicable to regions in need of new and more basic ways to provide treatment. Moore's Law, a paradigm that considers advancement synonymous with increased digitization and optimization of electronic processes, defines the history of technology. However, the functionality of advanced and "smart" technology is essentially useless in underdeveloped areas. These regions lack some of the basic requirements for innovative medical technologies to impact human health, such as electricity, access to spare parts, computer analysis tools, and network architecture. In addition, the poor physical infrastructure, insufficient management, and lack of technical culture are barriers for entry and sustainability of these technologies. Rather than importing medical devices from industrialized countries, we propose that the mindset and research focus for under developed areas must be on "successful" technologies. Simply put, these areas need technology that "gets the job done."

This book examines the potential to deploy low-cost, three-dimensional printers known as RepRaps in developing countries to fabricate surgical instruments and medical supplies to combat the "global surgical burden of disease." Approximately two billion people in developing countries around the world lack access to essential surgical services, resulting in the avoidable deaths of millions of individuals each year. A fundamental barrier that inhibits access to surgical care in these locations is the lack of basic surgical instruments and supplies in healthcare facilities. RepRap printers are highly versatile 3D printers assembled from basic, domestically sourced materials that can fabricate low-cost surgical instruments on-site, ultimately enhancing the interventional capacity of healthcare facilities to treat patients. Rather than focusing on one specific field of interest, this book takes an integrative approach that incorporates topics and methods from multiple disciplines ranging from global health and development economics to materials science and applied engineering. These topics include the feasibility of using bio-based plastics to fabricate surgical instruments via 3D printing sustainably, the application of "frugal innovation and engineering" in resource-poor settings, and analyses related to the social returns on investment, barriers to entry, and current and future medical device supply-chain paradigms. In taking a multi-disciplinary approach, the reader can gain a holistic understanding of the multiple facets related to implementing medical device innovations in developing countries.