Izzy Essary, 8, and Jerry Essary, 6, of South Texas College of Law Houston student Jessica Livsey, hold a thank you card they received from Houston healthcare workers for their custom ear guards. Courtesy photo.

Staying home like all of us, one Houston law student has found a way to make health care workers more comfortable while teaching her children about serving others.

Jessica Livsey, a rising third-year law student at South Texas College of Law Houston, has been working with her fiance and two children, who are 6 and 8 years old, to use the family's 3D printers to manufacture "ear guards" for health care workers.

Courtesy photo

The doctors and nurses who are treating COVID-19 patients suffer from ear pain from the elastic straps on their face masks. An ear guard goes on the back of the head and holds the elastic straps away from the ears.

"I've had people say, 'My husband is coming home with his ears bleeding,' " said Livsey, who works as a litigation intern in the Harris County Attorney's Office. " We don't know how to heal people, but we can do this."

Livsey and her fiance, Paul Ogin, have 3D printers at home to make plastic Battlebots for their children to compete in national tournaments.

During the coronavirus pandemic, Livsey saw a social media post about a family from Canada that used its 3D printers to make ear guards. Based on that family's design, Ogin created his own specs to make more ear guards in less time, Livsey said.

South Texas College of Law Houston student Jessica Livsey and her family are using 3D printers to manufacture ear guards for health care workers. Courtesy photo.

They printed their first ear guard about four weeks ago.

So far, Livsey's family has manufactured about 1,400 ear guards and donated them for free to health care workers, police, grocery workers and other types of front-line personnel in Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, California and other states. They also decided to purchase a fourth 3D printer for $300 to keep up with the demand.

Livsey said that she wakes up every four hours over night to start another batch of ear guards. The printers are working nonstop for now, and Livsey said she will only quit when the orders stop coming.

The family refuses to take payment for the ear guards. Livsey noted that aside from purchasing the new printer—which her children will keep using for robots after the pandemic passes—she's also stocked up on the printers' rolls of plastic film that cost $25 to $30 each. Sometimes she drives to deliver the product herself, and other times, she covers the cost of mailings. It's not breaking the bank, she added.

"I don't want to take anyone's money right now. It's a good thing for my kids to learn what service is," she said.

The other day while talking to their grandparents, Livsey's children said something that made her feel that they've taken her lesson to heart.

"They just said, 'What we are doing is helping,' " recalled Livsey. " This is helping people, so their ears don't hurt."