Student Design Awards winners: Without the waste
Brief 7: How might we use circular economy principles to rethink the storage, delivery and dispensing of tablet medication?
Winner:
- Allivate - Amy Philips, Ella Harvey, and Rebecca Paradise, Loughborough University, England
The mainstream solution offered to hayfever sufferers is taking daily tablets for life. Approximately 280 million antihistamine blister packs end up in landfill each year as part of this linear system. Allivate proposes using dissolvable microneedle patches to deliver antihistamines to users before eventually delivering a personalized 5 year course of immunotherapy that will dramatically reduce and eventually eradicate symptoms of hayfever, meaning medication is no longer needed. This combined solution produces 98% less waste compared to conventional blister packs.
Amy Philips, Ella Harvey, and Rebecca Paradise
Loughborough University, England
The GSK award of £2,000
Highly Commended
Aaron Salter, Adam Weir and Maxwell Stevens, Loughborough University, England
BioPill: A fully sustainable dispenser and medication management service which provides pre-filled and sorted medication biopods to the user.
Commended
Frances Adam, Brunel University London, England
Green Returns: A user-friendly, reusable and recyclable aluminium packaging solution which works within an Ontario-style deposit return scheme system.