Final Design Report: Infant Palate Models

The goal of our infant palate modeling project was to help our client Cygnus Lactation Services a women's health clinic that specializes in improving lactation outcomes for breastfeeding mothers. The senior consultants in the health clinic were struggling with training new consultants because there are not many lactation educational materials available on the market, and the consultants cannot ask parents to allow the consultant trainees to practice on their newborns.  Our project sought to create training materials for lactation consultants. The most common problems the consultants encounter are abnormal formations of the upper hard palate in babies, which cause imperfect latching when they are breastfeeding. We created lifelike newborn models with interchangeable mouth structures and molds of real-life common hard palate abnormalities consultants may encounter in their day-to-day work. (The molds were taken from my undergraduate dormmates, which had a surprising diversity in palate formation.) You can scroll through the detailed report below.

Credit to my teammates - Evan Costa, Jacob Finn-Samuels, Damien Heng, Benjamin Posner

My Professors - Professor John Lake and  Professor Laura Pigozzi

Thanks to our client - Jeni Gentry at Cygnus Lactation Services