Scottish Appeal for PPE

Our frontline health care workforce in Scotland are struggling to get the right standard of Personal Protective Equipment and they need our help. 

Our aim is to produce a minimum of 10,000 visors for those treating COVID patients in hospitals, GP practices, staff in care homes across Scotland and those providing help in the home to our elderly and vulnerable. The design we are printing is reusable which means once it is in the hands of those who need it, then it can be used to  protect staff every day.

To scale production and meet our target we need to raise £10,000 quickly and we are asking everyone across Scotland for their urgent help.

We recently issued a call to action for anyone with a 3D printer to help us produce these high quality, re-usable visors for use across Scotland. The response was phenomenal and we’ve been working hard ever since to co-ordinate production and distribution.

Thanks to the amazing help of our volunteers, visors are now coming in and are being distributed across Scotland but we need more and we need them fast. 

Those helping us produce visors have so far contributed the cost of materials from their own pockets but in order to produce the large amounts needed we want to raise funds to purchase materials for direct and rapid distribution. The way we make these visors is rapidly shifting as we find new and more efficient ways to produce them. 

The money we raise will be used to purchase materials, co-ordinate collection of visors, their assembly, sanitisation and distribution. Any surplus equipment produced will be distributed to other frontline workers and any surplus funding will be donated to NHS charities in Scotland.

Our Aims
We operate as a group called

COVID Safety Network www.covidsafetynetwork.com and our aims are:

1. To channel resources from the manufacturing supply chain to be directly spent on producing and delivering PPE for NHS & key workers with no profiteering.

2. To engage constantly in communication with Hospitals & GP practices to develop product enhancements with rapid prototyping.

3. To encourage collaboration with the supply chain, work with organisations which have the same core aims to make and deliver PPE.

4. To streamline logistics, provide network support and open-source digital solutions

5. To follow guidelines of health services and the medical profession wherever possible and practical in order to gain standard designs and approvals for the optimum solution under strict infection control protocols.

Our team consists of:

Michael O’Neil, MSc M.I.M.P.T is a Clinical Scientist and heads up the Regional Maxillofacial and Plastic Surgery Technical Service for NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde which is a team of 7 Maxillofacial Prosthetists who are based in laboratories in the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital and Glasgow Royal Infirmary. Their role is to rehabilitate patients who have lost part of their facial or body contour due to head and neck cancer or trauma. This can involve prosthetic eyes, ears, noses and various body parts.

In addition, Michael is also currently in charge of designing and co-ordinating production of protective visors for staff across the region’s hospitals and ensuring they are produced to the required standard.

Hannah Wright has a background in Creative enterprise and production management for TV and film. As co-founder of the Covid Safety Network, Hannah is the Project manager and has been working closely with the NHS and Maxillofacial Laboratory to assist in creating a network to makers to effectively gain access to resources and products.

Adam Winstanley is Tech & Supply Chain Integrator and Co-founder of COVID Safety Network. With a background in architecture, technology and business development, Adam is a “future thinker” so the network can continue to adapt and innovate to deliver what is needed as fast as possible.

Catrina O’Neil and Julie Cavanagh whose backgrounds are education and lifelong learning are providing both administrative support and help with marketing and communications. 

How it all started - a note from Michael:

Having the only 3D printer in the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, word quickly spread! We were soon receiving requests from ITU Consultants and medical staff throughout the Hospital to our Maxillofacial Laboratory for PPE. We investigated possible solutions and after infection control passed our face visor as reusable we trialled it with our ITU Neuro and Maxillofacial consultant surgeons. The adapted visor was verified for its quality and suitability. 

This visor takes longer to print but they have been designed so that they are reusable. They last longer and are more environmentally friendly. Some of the visors around are constructed quickly, but they are for single use only thus adding to the massive problem of landfill. 

Our printer is not the quickest however, so my wonderful friends reached out to come to our aid. In particular Rachel Grant at the Chamber of Commerce Glasgow and Dr Siobhán Jordan at interface-online.org.uk for their generous gesture to educational institutions and businesses alike. We have had help from Strathclyde University, St Andrew's University, University of Abertay and Glasgow University, not forgetting the many schools and technical departments and businesses from across Scotland as well as private individuals. We have also had support from English businesses and international companies.

Our unreserved thanks go to the hard-working 3DCrowd, the design team and the impact they are making. Thanks also go to the Covidsafteynetwork.com for their focus and direction. Our heartfelt thanks go out to everyone that has contributed to this campaign however small, in the fight to defeat this COVID-19 virus. We are forever indebted to you. Thank you!