Self-sufficient respiratory device and method

Inventors

Wang, Qing • Liu, Yong

Abstract

An integrated oxygen supply device that is configured to generate oxygen continuously and release the oxygen non-continuously is provided. In some embodiments, the oxygen generated by the integrated oxygen supply device is stored in a porous material with the integrated oxygen supply device. The delivery of the oxygen produced by integrated oxygen supply device to a patient, in those embodiments, is controlled. In some embodiments, the control of the delivering oxygen is according one or more breathing patterns. The breathing pattern(s) may or may not be a current breathing pattern of the patient. For example, in one embodiment, the breathing pattern is a predetermined breathing pattern with a specified inspiration period followed by a specified expiration period.

Core Innovation

The invention is an oxygen supply device that includes an air separation unit, a gas conditioning unit, and a gas delivery unit. The air separation unit receives ambient air and outputs oxygen, while the gas conditioning unit receives the oxygen and ambient air and outputs blended gas. The gas delivery unit receives the blended gas and facilitates a delivery of the blended gas to a user, and the air separation unit and the gas conditioning unit are located within a same housing of the oxygen supply device.

The invention further includes a compression unit configured to compress ambient air for injection into the air separation unit, where the compression unit is controllable such that a workload of the compression unit is adjustable based on a preset threshold. A heat exchanger is arranged between the compression unit and the air separation unit to facilitate heat exchange between a medium around the compression unit and a medium around the air separation unit. A heat communication is arranged between the heat exchanger and the gas conditioning unit to transmit heat to the gas conditioning unit for conditioning gas delivered to the patient.

The invention additionally addresses non-continuous oxygen release by releasing enriched oxygen in a pulsing mode according to breathing patterns using predetermined inspiration/expiration periods. Oxygen concentration control is based on nitrogen adsorption and nitrogen release controlled by oxygen concentration thresholding with inlet/outlet phase switching. The device can include an optional mode to stop ambient air blending for lower oxygen concentration using a pass-through mode, and it can blend enriched oxygen with ambient air in the gas conditioning unit to produce the blended gas delivered to the patient.

Claims Coverage

The document includes three independent claims: two device claims and one processor-implemented control method claim. Across these independent claims, there are four main inventive feature areas: integrated device housing for air separation and gas conditioning, controllable compression workload based on a preset threshold, thermal transfer using a heat exchanger and heat communication, and the control of blended gas delivery to a user or patient.

Overall claim coverage focuses on an oxygen supply device and a processor-implemented method that integrate ambient-air air separation and blended-gas conditioning within a same housing, while using a controllable compression workload based on a preset threshold and a thermal pathway using a heat exchanger plus heat communication to transfer heat to gas conditioning for delivery to the patient.

Stated Advantages

Documented Applications