Between the 8th and the 13th of October 2013, many presenters will be at MEDTRADE Conference to deliver information about the newest medical devices and equipment. For a couple of days, people suffering from heart disease will be able to discover what top-notch science and technology can make for them.
Heart failure is the first cause of death in the world
Cardiovascular (CVDs) diseases are responsible for half of the 36 million of annual death due to non-communicable diseases. CVDs include coronary diseases, strokes, cardiomyopathy, and cardiac dysrhythmia. Such diseases can affect anybody and appear more frequently with ageing. People without any hereditary predisposition are concerned too since some CVDs are due to bacteria, like streptococcus which may provoke myocarditis.
According to the World Health Organization, CVDs are the first cause of death in the world. In 2008, more than 17 million people died from a cardiovascular diseases and 3 millions of these people were less than 60 years old. CVDs strike regardless of gender but not of localization. The rate of premature death due to CVDs is 4% in developed countries, and 40% in developing countries. Hence 80% of CVDs-induced deaths occurs in developing countries.
Such differences stem from lower quality of life and access to healthcare. In the US, “some 60 million people in the US have heart disease, including hypertension, stroke and coronary artery disease” Dr. Rose Marie Roberston says. “As the population ages there are more people who have heart disease. However, the death rates from many forms of heart diseases are actually falling” the former President of the American Heart Association explains. The number of deaths due to heart disease may decrease in developed countries, but this figure keeps growing considerably in the developing world.
Curing heart disease with prevention, surgery and technology
Unbalanced diet, alcohol and tobacco consumption, as well as physical inactivity are commonly identified risk factors for CVDs. Most of these factors are behavioral factors. They are supposedly the easiest to get rid of but as a matter of fact, they are the fastest growing. Metabolic risks also stand for another significant part of these factors. Obesity, excess weight, diabetes, cholesterol, high blood pressure all make it more likely to get a CVD. Eventually, a person’s age, his psychological condition, his genetic predisposition adds up to the equation.
In order to lower the risk to get a CVD, prevention is the first step to take. Getting rid of unnecessary or risky habits and replacing them with healthy one is the easiest to stay healthy. Besides, women are more exposed to risky behaviors in this respect than men according to UC San Francisco’s cardiologist Dr. Anne Thorson. “One of the things that we’ve really got to get across to women is that they have control over reducing their risk of heart disease, and it may be just as simple as getting off the couch and getting into a regular exercise routine”, she says.
When preventive measures failed, surgery is the next resort. Heart bypass, coronary angioplasty are now common procedures. Even heart transplant and artificial heart transplant tend to become common. Concerning artificial heart, significant technological improvement occurred over the last years. Usual cumbersome pneumatic systems are progressively replaced with electric pump technology. The solution hence become more reliable as well as more convenient for the patient. But such improvements takes a lot of research.
Medical device engineering in general is a demanding industry. “Designing a safe and reliable battery for such devices requires a lot of technological expertise”, John Cavlovic says. John Cavlovic is sales director for Forsee Power Solutions, a battery system integrator and a specialist of medical equipment. Breathing assistance system, oxygen concentrator, infusion pump support patient’s autonomy and independence better today than they ever did before. But technology to come might allow even more possibilities. Bioprosthesis like Carmat’s prosthesis are composed of biological tissues and mechanical parts. According to Piet Jansen, Carmat’s chief medical officer, “the idea was to develop an artificial heart in which the moving parts that are in contact with the blood are made of tissue that is [better suited] for the biological environment”. In that scope, stem cells appear like a real opportunity for researchers. They could be used to regenerate a heart after being damage during a stroke.
Before resorting to heart transplant, many solutions can enable patients suffering from a heart disease to live a normal life. Pacemakers, automated external defibrillator are examples of the technical solutions most commonly used to help people suffering from CVD. Just like for artificial heart, energy supply remains the main technological challenge faced by designer. For instance, a defibrillator must feature a battery system that is able to deliver a large amount of energy within very short period of time although it stays inactive most of the time. According to Biophan’s CEO Michael Weiner, battery performance is a crucial development milestone for medical equipment today. “I believe the battery life of defibrillators is approximately 5 to 6 years, depending on the manufacturer, so a portion of that battery life is dedicated to the pacing circuit, and a portion of that is also dedicated to the defibrillator’s power needs. Any efficiency in these devices that are trying to maximize length of battery life has potential merit” he says.
There is a reason why some articles reviewing automated external defibrillator produced by Welsh Allyn, CardiAir and METsis Medikal are entitled “Checking Your AED Battery Could Be the Difference between Life and Death” and so forth. That kind of statement Forsee Power Solutions’ CTO Philippe Alleil would agree with. “There are industry in which safety expectations are so high that no margin of error is allowed” he says, “When it comes to embedded power supply, you cannot set the same system on a defibrillator and an MP3 player”. Potential improvements are numerous and research keeps going on.