Home of the Scratchi Surrogate Contact Device
Summary: The rapid spread of Covid 19 is requiring a complete re-thinking of how to augment the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) toolkit. A proposed Surrogate Contact Device (SCD) has the ability to reduce the spread of disease and strengthen the PPE toolkit by providing a safe alternative to touching one’s face and contacting environmental surfaces.
Description: The proposed SCD is a pocket tool that can resemble a modified retractable utility knife or clip onto a smart phone case. The “blade” element is replaced with two retractable surfaces: i) a surface that interacts with the environment for pushing (doors, elevator buttons), pulling (door handles), and scribing (credit card signature pads); and ii) a surface that interacts with the face including a scratching surface to mimic fingernails, a rubbing surface to mimic the fingertip and a small hook to adjust eyeglasses and face mask.
Studies have shown that infection rates have a linear relationship to the frequency of hand contact with the face and environment. (eg: reducing the frequency of hand contact 70% leads to the same 70% decrease in infection rates. |
| Contact is driven by conscious and subconscious behavior, and mechanical PPE solutions must therefore also include improve behavior modification as well |
