According to Tom Fripp, industrial designer and founder of Fripp Design, “Conventional maxillofacial prosthetics are incredibly laborious and expensive to produce". In a process that can span up to 10 weeks, designers “have to take an impression from the area of trauma, cast a plaster positive, then make a mould, carve the desired form in wax, and cast it in silicone. The end result of this handmade process costs between £1,500 to £3,000 ($2399-4798).”
To bring down the cost of creating these prosthetics, Fripp teamed up with researchers at the University of Sheffield to create a 3D printing process that can build a facial prosthetic in only 48 hours, with successive prints costing less than 10% of their handmade alternatives.
Key to the team’s new process is a high-resolution 3D scan of the patient’s face. Once scanned, the topography of the patient’s face can be integrated with one of several stock facial prosthetic models to form a perfect, natural looking fit.
While Fripp and his colleagues at the University of Sheffield have proven that their new technique can dramatically reduce the time and cost of facial prosthetics, the technology is still about a year away from approval by health authorities. Even then, Sheffield professor Ric van Noort says, “We’re not looking to replace maxillofacial technologies, but we’re looking to replace the detailed, time consuming, expensive side of the work”.
For those in need of facial prosthetics, this low-cost 3D printing solution could be just the thing they were looking for; as every new prosthetic serves to soften the psychological anguish that accompanies a devastating facial injury.
Source: The Guardian
Image and Video Courtesy of Fripp Design & University of Sheffield