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University of Nebraska Medical Center

The MicroWash

Artists rendering of the MicroWash

During the COVID-19 pandemic, it quickly became apparent the nasopharyngeal swab method of specimen collection was invasive, painful and placed our health care work force at risk of infection.

A team of emergency medicine clinicians drew from their wound care experience and developed the MicroWash. The MicroWash is a nasopharyngeal lavage device designed to gently irrigate the nasal passage with sterile saline while seamlessly recapturing the saline backwash for viral testing. Prospective clinical trials were conducted which demonstrated consistently high MicroWash specimen adequacy when compared to the nasopharyngeal swab collection method. But more importantly, patients reported higher acceptance of the MicroWash (100%) concept with a pain rating of 0.3/10 when compared to the nasopharyngeal swab collection method (25%, 8/10).

Development of the MicroWash was guided by development principles such as human factors engineering and design cycles. Utilizing 3D modeling and printing technologies available in the MakER Lab, the team was able to rapidly produce prototypes of the MicroWash for early validation studies, today the MicroWash is being injected molded for large scale production.

For more information, please visit the MicroWash information page at www.GetMicroWash.com.