Vickers model 47 portable 'egg' incubator, c. 1970

Vickers portable ‘Egg’ incubator, model 47, with broken fragments in bag, Vickers Medical, circa 1970. Incubator contains electronic thermostat, micro-switch temperature control and warning alarm for overheating.

This revolutionary incubator for sick and premature babies was designed and developed in 1964 by Graham Grant while he was a medical student at St Mary’s Hospital in London. The unit was designed to transport infants born at home to hospital by ambulance and was powered by the vehicle’s battery. Further units were kept in standby mode at Queen Charlotte’s maternity hospital in London, ready for emergency use. This example was acquired from St Anne's Hospital, Bristol in 1997.

Grant originally trained as a mechanical engineer in Sydney before moving to the UK to study medicine, specialising in anaesthesia. To help fund his studies, he worked on Wednesday afternoons as a design consultant for the medical equipment manufacturer Oxygenaire Ltd. at their nearby Shepherd’s Bush factory.

The company’s existing portable incubator, ambulance staff reported, struggled to retain enough heat to keep a premature baby alive on the coldest winter nights. Grant spent the next two years developing and refining his improved model, which featured a double-layered Perspex shell for optimal insulation. Its egg shape served to further reduce heat loss by minimising the internal surface area. A motor-operated blower circulated warm humidified air across the chamber, and the chrome railing protected its precious cargo from any knocks encountered in a moving ambulance.

In 1964, when Grant’s improved model was almost complete, Oxygenaire Ltd. was bought out and taken over by Vickers Medical Ltd., who moved the Oxygenaire factory to a new industrial site in Basingstoke, Hampshire.