State Government of Victoria

Innovation and the baby teat

'Having this project funded by the Victorian Government means we can take the project from start to finish in one continuous process and there are many benefits to that in terms of time and cost effectiveness and getting the best out of the product.'
Callum MacLeod, Project Manager, APS Innovations

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  • Government funding has allowed APS Innovations to devote more time to consult, research and refine their product to better meet the unique needs of the customer.

Innovation and the baby teat

For a transcript of this video, please view it on Youtube. 

The Challenge

The Royal Children’s Hospital Nutrition & Food Services provides nutrition care to over 150 infants daily. This includes sick and small neonates, and infants undergoing cardiac surgery with complex nutrition needs and feeding difficulties. The service uses up to 400 teats daily, and currently these often fail to meet the needs of infants with feeding difficulties.

Teats have been found to produce flow rates varying by as much as 50%. The wrong flow rate makes it difficult for an infant learning to feed, but as the flow rate is highly sensitive to the force applied when teats and bottles are assembled, the appropriate teat for an infant can be very difficult to identify.

The Solution

Beginning as a specialist services company to the plastics industry, APS Innovations has grown to be a company capable of developing products from a simple, single component to complex electro-mechanical devices.
 
APS Innovations' investigation into a solution has shown that well designed venting is essential in obtaining and maintaining a constant flow through the teat.

The solution developed by APS Innovations incorporates a teat form that has been anatomically designed to suit the needs of feeding infants. The teat also incorporates an optimised venting system and is manufactured using innovative state of the art manufacturing techniques in Victoria.

APS Innovations has identified and sourced new non-toxic material, customised the teat form and developed a compatible feeding bottle to deliver reliable flow with the additional benefits of easy flow identification, recyclability and simpler functionality.

This project was funded under the Victorian Government's Market Validation Program (MVP). The new Driving Business Innovation Program builds on the MVP.

The result

APS Innovations, with input from the Royal Children’s Hospital, has developed an optimised infant feeding teat and bottle that will be manufactured in Victoria.

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State Government of Victoria

State Government of Victoria

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Page updated: 29 Apr 2016