José Gómez-Márquez builds strange-looking medical equipment: pregnancy tests that look like Lego kits, inhalers inspired by plastic toy helicopters, and centrifuges made from toilet plungers. His inventions aren’t destined for high-tech hospitals—-they’re headed to poor countries where electricity, high-tech medical materials, and health personnel are often scarce.
Gómez-Márquez’s innovative work earned him a spot in Technology Review‘s TR35, the magazine’s annual list of innovators under 35: He’s their 2009 humanitarian of the year.
His designs are practical, functional, and innovative, and one of his new projects aims to spread that spirit around. “He is now creating development kits for medical technology–sort of like Erector sets for medical professionals–which will initially be used in Nicaragua,” writes Technology Review. “The kits will enable doctors and medical students to devise diagnostics, drug delivery devices, microfluidic chips, and more.”
Read more about Gómez-Márquez’s incredible story, which involves lots of childhood visits to doctors’ offices in his home country of Honduras, and watch him demonstrate some of his inventions in this short video.
Source: Technology Review
