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Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales
The prototype of the Williams Pneumoflater created by the donor, Dr T.M.Williams, Skewen, a consultant anaesthetist at Morriston Hospital, Swansea. Later adapted by The British Oxygen Company, the machine provides mechanical means for artificial respiration. Made from a cocoa tin and other small accessories, gas operated.
This apparatus was meant to be inserted into the type of anaesthetic machine then in use (in the late 1940s). Its function was as an "automatic breathing device", which allowed the lungs to be mechanically inflated while the patient was in a state of anaesthesia. It could be used for long periods of time if necessary, which was particularly useful in chest surgery. First used at Morriston Hospital, Swansea at the end of the 1940s. After 3 years, it had been used in more than 900 major operations
