Animal Experiment of the Pneumatic Ventrivular Assist Device

Park, Sung Sik; Kim, Sam Hyun; Seo, Pil Won; Choi, Chang Hyu; Lee, Hoon Sang; Lee, Hyuck Soo; Hwang, Seung Ok; An, Hyuk

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Ventricular assist devices(VADs) are being used for patients in postcvardiotomy cardiogenic shock status bridge to cardiac transplant settings and in post-myocardial infarction cardiogenic shock. The VAD which was developed at the Deparment of medical engineering in Dankook University College of Medicine was a pneumatically driven device and can maintain pulsatile flow. The goal of this study is to develop animal experimental models using the VAD and to clarify the reliability and hemodynamic property adequacy of end organ perfusion durability and severity of thrombotic-hemolytic tendency of the device. MATERIAL AND METHOD: The pneumatic VAD was applied to 8 adult female lambs, We examined some hemodynamic parameters such as arterial blood pressure pulmonary capillary wedge pressure(pcwp) pulmonary artery pressure(PAP) left atrial pressure hour urine output cardiac index VAD flow EKG to determine the reliability of the VAD and hemodynamic compatibility of the experimental animals within 24 hours of experiment. We also observed the end organ perfusion durability of the VAD and thrombotic-hemolytic property of the VAD after 24 hours of VAD insertion. RESULT: We could monitor all hemodynamic parameters including pcwp PAP cardiac index EKG, adn hour urine as true clinical settings. We observed that the reliability of the VAD was excellent and the hemodynamic property of the experimental animal and end organ perfusion were adequate within 24 hours of experiment. In four lambs surviving 24 hours after insertion the reliability of the VAD and end organ perfusion were excellent and no thrombotic-hemolytic tendency was noted. However after 15 days of experiment the diaphragm of the VAD was torn and it was recommende that the durability of the VAD should be extended.
CONCLUSION
e conclude that the pneumatic VAD developed at Dankook University Biomedical Engineering has good hemodynamic property and low thromboembolic tendency and presents adequate end organ perfusion but we noted that the durability of the device should be expanded further. It will be possible to do more reliable experiment in the future according to the animal experimental method developed in this study especially with the heart failure models.