Ask HN: Is anyone working on a less painful intubation tube?
Try and break the problem down with systems thinking. Here&#x27;s an example of this:<p><pre><code>  ━━1=&gt; The output effect you&#x27;re trying to eliminate&#x2F;reduce is pain and swelling in respiratory tract.
    ┗━━2=&gt; Hypothesis (needs testing): This is caused by physical irritation of the tube
       ┗━━3=&gt; Hypothesis (needs testing): That irritation is caused by A) friction and B) physical pressure
          ┣━━4a=&gt; How can we reduce friction?
          ┃  ┗━━5a=&gt; Would a lubricant on the tube meet engineering constraints and reduce friction?
          ┃     ┗━━6a=&gt; Would the use of lubricant in practice create added risks or difficulties in the operating room?
          ┃         ┗━━7a=&gt; Hypothesis: Yes, due to the application of lubricant necessitating a glove-change afterwards.
          ┃           ┗━━8a=&gt; How can we overcome problems with lubricant application to the intubation tube?
          ┃              ┗━━9a=&gt; Would passing the intubation tube through a no-mess, easy-to-use &quot;self lubricating ring&quot; mitigate added risks or difficulties in the operating room?
          ┗━━4b=&gt; How can we reduce physical pressure?
             ┗━━5b=&gt; Would reducing the diameter meet engineering constraints and reduce pressure?
                ┗━━6b=&gt; If there is a minimum diameter requirement needed to deliver oxygen, would dynamically changing the diameter of the tube (e.g. inflating it) after insertion create a reduction in pressure?

</code></pre>
So that&#x27;s a very simplified example of how to solve problems with systems thinking (although in reality it would be WAY more detailed and actually test each hypothesis).<p>The problem is very rarely &quot;money&quot; in medical fields, the problem is someone actually identifying the root problem&#x2F;s, i.e. the &quot;problem behind the problem behind the problem&quot;, and applying engineering to solve <i>that</i>, which solves the problem one level above it, etc.<p>If you&#x27;re interested in this, read up on things like &quot;the five whys&quot;, a systems approach to problem solving invented at Toyota.