Next time there’s a medical emergency and you’re forced to yell, “Is there a doctor in the house,” go ahead and add, “And an engineer, too?” It turns out that you can never tell when one you may need one.
Pexels This story takes place on an airplane where a 30 year old male passenger with Type 1 diabetes had lost his insulin pump while going through airport security. With the plane in the air and his blood sugar spiking to dangerous levels, flight attendants leapt into action to get him the medical attention he so desperately needed. A Russian doctor, who was also a diabetic, happened to be on the same flight, and, though he didn’t speak the same language as the Dutch man, was able to diagnose the situation and ascertain what had to be done. Because of his condition, the doctor had insulin with him on the plane and a device to administer it.
Public Domain Pictures What the doctor discovered, however, is that his insulin pen used a cartridge containing a slow working insulin, completely different than the one that Thomas, the patient, needed. The doctor tried to rig the contraption to make it work, but after making the adjustment, the needle wouldn’t move and administer the insulin. That’s when Karttikeya Mangala, a 21 year old electrical engineering student came forward and offered his services. IFLScience takes the story from there: After hearing the plane was heading for an emergency landing, Karttikeya talked to the doctor about attempting to fix the pen and cartridge dilemma. The doctor said there was a way to change the cartridge holding tube diameter, but when he finished making the adjustment, the needle wouldn’t move.
_
_
Flickr With the plane starting its decent but not able to land for another hour and a half, and the doctor concerned he didn’t have that long, Karttikeya used the plane’s WiFi to download a PDF of the pen’s design schematic. It became apparent that a small spring just behind the cartridge was missing from the device. “Keeping a cool head, I instructed the air hostess to ask the passengers for any ballpoint pens, which usually have a spring in them. In a few minutes, I got 4-5 pens from the anxious passengers,” writes Karttikeya.
Remarkably, one passenger had a spring that was a perfect fit. They assembled the pen back together with the makeshift spring and the doctor injected Thomas with his own insulin cartridge. Within 15 minutes, his blood sugar levels stopped rising and then slowly ticked back down to normal, before he returned to consciousness. The day was saved. Here’s Karttikeya’s story in his own words. What a great young man to keep a cool head and do everything he could to save a fellow human being! The world could definitely use more people like Karttikeya.