Hi steemians
For years, scientists have been working hard to develop artificial hearts that can match biological hearts, despite the modest results of those hearts, but we do not deny the tremendous progress in technology and its ability to overcome all technical obstacles.
In this article I would like to share with you the history of artificial hearts and the way to reach solutions for patients with heart failure.
Since 1969, many companies have developed artificial hearts. About 450 artificial or semi-artificial hearts were laid. Gradually, their reliability has increased to reach the heart completely autonomous.
1st heart 1969:
The first implantation of an "artificial heart" on a human takes place on April 2, 1969 by Denton Cooley and Domingo Liotta in Huston. The patient died on April 8, are condition being very critical.
The failure of this first human "artificial heart" has severely hampered research in this area.
Image source Heart of Dr Cooley
jarvik 7 1982
In 1982 finally, the research is revived. Robert Koffler Jarvik, born in 1946, is the inventor of the first artificial heart implanted permanently. He was sensitized by the problem of heart failure because his father suffered from this disease.
His prototype, which he named Jarvik 7, was first introduced in 1982 on Barney Clarke. He was not a candidate, for several reasons, for a heart transplant, but accepted the implantation of this artificial heart. Jarvik Heart transplants a very large artificial heart connected to an external compressor of about 40 kg: the patient will die after 112 days.
The formation of blood clots was common with this prototype causing cardiovascular accidents, in addition the external machine was also a major drawback.
Image source Robert Jarvik
Image source Jarvik 7
Abiocor 2001
Abiocor is an electro-hydraulic artificial heart made of titanium and biocompatible plastic. It is the first one that is wireless and fully implantable in the patient's chest and that can replace the myocardium. Her first human transplant was in 2001 at Jewish Hospital in Louisville. Only patients who have only one month to live, if the transplant is contraindicated and other treatments are exhausted, can receive this artificial heart. This allows them to gain about 5 months of life.
It was created by the company Abiomed and weighs less than a kilogram. It consists of two artificial ventricles, a pumping system and polyurethane valves like other surfaces in contact with the blood.
This heart is able to pump blood while simulating the heart rate. Unlike pneumatic artificial hearts, it prevents the patient from being connected to a machine since it is powered by an internal battery that can be recharged remotely. Abiocor allows a better quality of life: the risk of infections is reduced, patients can stay at home thanks to remote diagnosis, and they can also bathe.
However, it also has constraints, due to its size, 13cm long and 8cm wide, it can not be implanted in a woman and only in 50% of men.
That's why AbioMed abandoned the AbioCor project to focus on the development of AbioCor II.
Image source Abiocor
Carmat 2013
On December 18, 2013, the first true transplant of an artificial heart, produced by Carmat, was successfully completed at the Georges Pompidou European Hospital in Paris. It was performed on a man of seventy-five years without meeting, it seems, more difficult than a transplant "ordinary" heart. The artificial heart was immediately functional. After 75 days of almost normal life, the transplant patient died.
By the end of August 2016, five patients implanted with a Carmat artificial heart all died.
two deaths among the five had been caused by a "micro-leakage of the blood zone to the actuating liquid of the prosthesis", having caused a "disruption of the engine control electronics" of the artificial heart, according to the analyzes of Carmat.
Image source Carmat heart
Arificial heart animation
Great efforts by scientists, doctors and engineers to save thousands of people suffering from heart failure deserve all the encouragement and admiration and I am sure that we will hear one day about kidney or liver or artificial lung and perhaps artificial brain !! And what do you think about the subject ??
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