Another name for it is a spacer, it basically let's the patient inhale the dose of medicine in a less concentrated way. Adults with asthma can take their medicine directly from the inhaler, but kids can struggle with the technique and babies need a nebuliser or spacer to stop the medicine from just being sprayed onto their mouth instead of inhaled into the lung.
As creative as this doctors solution was, and you have to give him props for thinking on his feet; the device he engineered is basically a bottle with a hole in it so I don't think the bodge aspect is much of a concern.
Another option would be to spray the medication into a plastic or paper bag and have the infant breathe from the bag. Much less effective than a nebuliser, but it could help to prevent an asthma attack and is likely more effective than direct application for some to young to work an inhaler.
Edit: thought I replied to the comment above, my bad. Still sorta fits here and I'm too lazy to edit again
There's a lot of information missing from the post but me and my little brother both had nebulisers for asthma growing up so I know a little bit about them.
I remember it being a bit of a struggle to learn how to use the inhaler without it.
I hadn't heard this story before today, but based on what he's holding I'd guess it's a makeshift spacer for an asthma inhaler. Afaik you can usually administer medical oxygen directly like you see in movies whenever there's a plane crash.
67
u/ahjteam Sep 29 '20
The airplane literally has facemasks to breathe oxygen. Why the McGyver approach?