Emergency Design and Production of Level 1 Hospital Gowns During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has induced a massive shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) across the United States. To alleviate the crisis, efforts to develop rapidly-producible PPE should be explored. Herein, we present the rapid design and production process of level 1 hospital gowns to address this dire shortage at a large academic healthcare organization taken by a team of student engineers at the University of Minnesota. We detail the collaborative process of gown design, considering its constraints (time, cost, material, rapid producibility, volume, and delivery), in addition to how material manufacturers and converters were identified to alleviate this crisis.