technology
Flying maggots
set to take off
Long-endurance aircraft HQ-i60b in flight off the coast of Darwin. Photo: Latitude Engineering
W
The future
of medical
transport in
remote areas
may lie in the
use of drones.
Peter Tatham
interviewed by
Dallas Bastian
hen a patient in a remote community
needs medical supplies from the nearest
major city, the best solution might be
using a drone that can travel long distances.
Researchers from Griffith University have explored
the potential for long-endurance aircraft to
support the provision of maggots, used in maggot
debridement therapy, to remote locations.
The research team interviewed people who either
have experience in the use of these drones or in the
provision of healthcare to remote communities in
Western Australia.
Nursing Review spoke with research lead and
professor of humanitarian logistics at Griffith
University, Peter Tatham, about the potential
benefits of using drones to deliver supplies over
long distances, the role health staff would play in the
operation and what it would take to see this use of
drones take off.
NR: Why did the team decide to look into long-
endurance aircraft in the medical context? When
might one be needed?
PT: There’s been a lot of publicity about the use
of remotely piloted aircraft systems, or drones,
whether it’s for delivering pizzas or whatever, and I
was thinking about how we could engage that in the
post-disaster context.
Then, talking to [doctoral student] Frank Stadler
about his research in maggot debridement therapy,
I thought here is a great opportunity, potentially,
to support remote communities in, for example,
Western Australia.
24 | nursingreview.com.au
In such communities, there’s quite a percentage
of trauma caused by traffic accidents, diabetes,
burns, agricultural accidents, and so on. Therefore,
supporting those patients at some distance from my
medical centre has great difficulties, particularly for
example in the wet season, where roads are often
impassable.
So the question was whether drones could be
used to help circumvent this.
How would it work?
Well, there are many different drones available. My
recent research showed there are 270 companies
worldwide in 57 countries. So the available
technology is massive, from the handheld toy you
might get in your Christmas stocking, to the top
end of a military-specification Global Hawk, which
comes in at about $130 million.
Some of the smaller ones, which are typically
battery-powered and have a range of about 30
minutes or 60–75km, have been used in the
Amazon, Papua New Guinea, Malawi and Rwanda,
for example. But nobody has really looked at
these larger, or long-endurance, drones, as they’re
known technically. And the one which we used as
an example, and it is one of several on the market,
was from a company called Latitude Engineering.
In particular, it has a range of 1000km at a speed of
about 70km/h and can carry a payload of about 5kg.
So, how would this operate? One scenario was
a community in the region of Broome in Western
Australia. One would envisage this drone being
located at the airport in Broome. If a medical staff