Abstract
The modern acoustic stethoscope is a useful clinical tool used to detect subtle, pathological changes in cardiac, pulmonary and vascular sounds. Currently, brand-name stethoscopes are expensive despite limited innovations in design or fabrication in recent decades. Consequently, the high cost of high quality, brand name models serves as a barrier to clinicians practicing in various settings, especially in low- and middle-income countries. In this publication, we describe the design and validation of a low-cost open-access (Free/Libre) 3D-printed stethoscope which is comparable to the Littmann Cardiology III for use in low-access clinics.
Highlights
Since its introduction in 1819 by Rene Laennec[1], the acoustic stethoscope has been an integral part of clinical medicine
The high cost of modern stethoscopes remains a significant barrier to physicians and allied health professionals practicing in the developed word and in low- and middle-income countries, where few affordable high-quality options exist
We describe the construction and validation of a low cost, Free/open access 3D printed acoustic stethoscope—referred to here as the ‘Glia model’
Summary
Since its introduction in 1819 by Rene Laennec[1], the acoustic stethoscope has been an integral part of clinical medicine. Despite the lack of major structural design innovations over recent decades, modern stethoscopes can be an expensive part of the physician’s armamentarium, often costing several hundred US dollars. The high cost of modern stethoscopes remains a significant barrier to physicians and allied health professionals practicing in the developed word and in low- and middle-income countries, where few affordable high-quality options exist. While other 3D printed stethoscope models that would be low-cost to produce can be found online[5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15], we are not aware of any that have been used clinically or research-validated
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