CAD Automation and Workflow Development for Novel Obstructive Sleep Apnea Prosthesis

Abstract

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) affects millions of people every year, but standard treatments such as CPAP machines and mandibular advancement devices are invasive, uncomfortable, and troublesome to use. Patients will sometimes refuse these treatments altogether due to the associated negative impact on their lives. For the past year, I have worked within MIT Catalyst’s OSA research group to fabricate custom-fit, suction-activated mouthguards as a more comfortable and less intrusive alternative for OSA treatment. The mouthguard prostheses are being tested in an MIT study, with preparation to be tested in a VA clinical trial, where scalability and precision of manufacturing are crucial to procure meaningful data.

To address this need for scalability and precision, the thesis will investigate methods, implementation, and results of code I have developed to automate portions of the device’s 3D CAD protocol. The goal of such automation is primarily to decrease human error in key design steps such as defining mouthguard curvature, and secondarily to increase the repeatability and efficiency of repetitive steps such as combining mesh components. More broadly, the thesis will assess the potential for this CAD protocol to be modularized into manual, semi-automated, and fully automated segments, with scripts being run via the Fusion360 CAD interface.