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Under the Hood

NIV in a Hood Greenhouse is a transparent individual patient
hood that enables non-invasive ventilation procedures

ne of the difficulties involved in treating COVID–19 patients on respiratory

O support is that non‫־‬invasive ventilation (NIV) methods can result in the
contamination of the air around the patient. To protect medical staff,

mechanical (invasive) ventilation is applied, which requires anesthesia, although it

might not always be medically required.

At Tamar Robotics, which develops neurosurgical robotic technology solutions,

routine development work was suspended in favor of addressing this problem.

After four weeks of intense efforts, the company introduced "NIV in a Hood

Greenhouse," a transparent individual patient hood connected to

a standard clean room filter. The system removes the potentially

contaminated air exhaled by the patient, preventing the spread of

infectious diseases. The patient can eat and drink inside the hood, as

well as see the medical staff and speak with them, while they, in turn,

have access to the patient’s head and chest without exposure to the

contaminated air.

Noam Hassidov, CEO of the Tamar NIV group, and Dr. Hadas Ziso, the

company’s CTO, are both alumni of the Mechanical Engineering Faculty. Prof. Moshe
Another co‫־‬founder is Prof. Moshe Shoham, currently the Head of the Shoham: “Our
Robotics Laboratory and Head of the Medical Robotics Laboratory at engineers performed
the Technion’s Mechanical Engineering Faculty. Shoham was also a co‫־‬ extraordinarily—
founder of the Mazor Robotics biotech company, which was bought by coming up with a
Medtronic for $1.64 billion two years ago. "We dedicated all our efforts solution, designing
to finding solutions that could help fight the pandemic," he says. "Our

engineers performed extraordinarily‫־‬coming up with a solution, designing and manufacturing

and manufacturing the system, and then installing and operating it in the system, and

hospitals, all within one month." then installing

The system is currently being used in coronavirus wards and emergency and operating it
rooms at the Carmel Medical Center and the Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital. in hospitals, all
The hood is also drawing interest from abroad, particularly in countries within one month”
where the pandemic is still at its peak. "This development can be used

for patients with any type of contagious lung infection, once the current

pandemic is contained," Prof. Shoham explains.

Another joint start‫־‬up by Prof. Shoham and the Technion, Diagnostic Robotics,

has developed a remote assessment and monitoring computer application that

helps predict viral spread. This tool is already applied by the Israeli Ministry of

Health and by Israeli healthcare providers, and has recently been adopted by

organizations in the United States and in India.

10 | MEgazine | Faculty of Mechanical Engineering