Young engineers design a device to measure blood clotting time

Damascus (ST): In order to save time and effort and obtain accurate blood parameters compared to devices that measure blood clotting time, a number of young engineers in the Medical Engineering Department of the Faculty of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering at Damascus University designed a device to measure blood clotting time, with the support of the university and the Higher Commission for Scientific Research.

Engineers, Muhammad Omar Al-Halabi, Muhammad Habib, Muhammad Anwar Mansour, Muhammad Al-Houri, and Hussam Khawlani, explained in statements that the function of the device is to measure the time it takes to  stop external bleeding, “the time of formation of a blood clot,” and to monitor blood fluidity in patients who are under treatment with anticoagulants, anti-vitamin K. The device also detects  a deficiency in one of the clotting factors before any surgical procedure, and the hereditary deficiency of clotting factors, in addition to monitoring patients who are treated with the blood thinner heparin.

Regarding the mechanism of action of the device, they indicated that it depends on the magnetic principle, where the blood sample is placed in a “cuvette” inside which there is a ball that is attracted by the effect of the magnetic field in two opposite directions.

Regarding the difficulties that faced the design, the engineers explained that it is represented in the high sensitivity of dealing with blood, the difficulty of simulating the “mechanism” used for measurement, the difficulty of adjusting the optical mechanism, and the inability to perform sufficient measurements on patients to complete the calibration, in addition to the high prices of the analysis chip “kit” and chemicals assigned to the coagulation process, and the inability to standardize the device due to the lack of samples carried out on it.

K.Q.