By Diana Lara, UC Health
UC researchers’ tiny tech tool makes emergency resuscitation easier for all.
Every second counts in critical moments when someone stops breathing. Yet, the life-saving tools available in places like football fields, restaurants, or even the battlefield are often rudimentary.
That could soon change thanks to a groundbreaking innovation from researchers and clinicians at the University of Cincinnati (UC).
After years of meticulous development, Justin Benoit, MD, Jason McMullan, MD, and Ephraim Gutmark, PhD, have launched Rescue Ventilation Solutions (RVS), a startup aimed at revolutionizing emergency resuscitation.
RVS’s product, nicknamed “Spiritus,” is a novel technology that has been in development since 2017 and is designed to attach to any standard bag-valve mask used when someone stops breathing, such as during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).
Using a bag-valve mask without a means to measure critical variables—such as the amount of air being delivered, the rate of breaths, and the pressure exerted—can be perilous.
As Benoit explains, “It’s like flying a plane with no gauges. How someone uses a bag-valve mask determines how much oxygen is in the blood, the pH of the blood, and the circulation to the heart muscle itself—all of which can determine life or death.”
RVS’s tiny, two-inch device, weighing less than 100 grams, promises to bring the precision of a ventilator to the palm of a bystander or first responder.
While highly effective, traditional mechanical ventilators are cumbersome andexpensive, weighingin at around30+ pounds and costing thousands of dollars. They are not practical in most emergency situations outside of a hospital. When someone stops breathing in a supermarket aisle, on a sports field, or in a school, the tools at hand are usually limited to mouth-to-mouth resuscitation or a bag-valve mask.
The Spiritus device is inexpensive, portable, disposable, and, above all, accessible, unlike bulky ventilators, typically confined to hospital settings due to their size and weight.
The urgency of RVS’s mission becomes clear when you consider the stakes.
In 2023, during the first quarter of the Jan. 2 football game in Cincinnati, Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin, a 24-year-old, tackled Bengals receiver Tee Higgins, taking him to the ground. Hamlin stood up after the tackle and took two steps but then collapsed to the turf and immediately went into cardiac arrest. McMullen was on the field and began administering CPR using a bag-valve mask.Hamlin’s heartbeat was revived on the field before being taken to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center.
The delicate nature of the lungs adds to the complexity. Delivering too much air can result in air entering the stomach instead of the lungs, or worse, it could cause a lung to rupture—a potentially fatal outcome, as the lungs are a delicate, complicated living tissue.
With the intellectual property (IP) license now granted by the UC Office of Technology Transfer, located within the 1819 Innovation Hub, RVS is moving forward with the final development of its minimum viable product (MVP), a critical step before presenting it to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for approval. This regulatory milestone is essential for the commercialization of the device, and RVS is actively seeking an investor to accelerate the process.
Beyond civilian use, RVS’s potential has drawn interest from the U.S. military, particularly the Air Force, given the University of Cincinnati’s long-standing connections in trauma research.
“You can imagine how the military isn’t going to carry a transport ventilator onto the battlefield,” Benoit remarks.
Feature Image: Co-founder Jason McMullan presents Spiritus technology. UC Health photo