Elastically Deformable Retention Features for Catheter Device Loading
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current implantable cardiac pacing systems face challenges with mechanical and MRI compatibility issues due to elongate lead wires, prompting the need for compact devices that can be easily delivered and retrieved, with existing tethering methods being tedious and requiring improvements for efficiency.
Innovation Solution
A compact implantable medical device and catheter system featuring elastically deformable retention features at the catheter's distal end, which expand to secure and release the device, allowing for easy loading, delivery, and retrieval by deforming to accommodate the device's holding member and fixation mechanism.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If traditional tethering methods are used to secure the device to the catheter, then the device can be delivered and retrieved, but the process becomes tedious and operationally complex
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces the manual mechanical tethering process with an automated mechanical interlocking system. The retention features automatically engage with the device holding member through elastic deformation, eliminating the need for manual threading and tying of tethers. This substitution maintains reliable device securing while dramatically simplifying the operator's task to merely pushing the device into the catheter.
Solution Approach 2:
The retention features are designed to automatically secure the device without operator intervention. When the device holding member is pushed into the catheter, the elastic retention features autonomously deform and interlock with the holding member, creating a self-securing mechanism. Similarly, retrieval is self-activating when the operator pulls on the tether, automatically disengaging the interlocking features.
2Ease of operation
If the catheter distal opening is kept open to facilitate device loading, then device insertion is easier, but the device cannot be securely retained
Solution Approach 1:
The retention features are designed as dynamic elastic elements that can deform between two states: an open configuration during device loading and a closed interlocking configuration during device retention. This dynamic behavior allows the catheter distal opening to adapt its state based on the operational phase, providing both easy loading and secure retention without compromise.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes parameter changes in the physical state of the retention features, specifically their elastic deformation. The features transition from a deformed state (allowing passage) to a recovered state (providing interlocking retention). This parameter change enables the same structure to perform both functions of facilitating loading and securing the device, resolving the contradiction between ease of loading and retention security.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If a compact device design is used to eliminate lead wires, then mechanical and MRI compatibility issues are reduced, but the device requires more precise delivery and retrieval mechanisms
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the complex tethering and securing mechanisms from the device itself and relocates them to the catheter structure. The retention features are integral to the catheter, not the device, which simplifies the device design while maintaining sophisticated delivery and retrieval capabilities. This extraction allows the compact device to benefit from reduced complexity while the catheter assumes the functional complexity of the delivery system.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This solution enhances the ease and efficiency of loading and retrieving the medical device, improving the operational efficiency of implant procedures by simplifying the attachment and detachment process, reducing procedural complexity, and ensuring secure engagement and disengagement at the implant site.
Implementation Method 1
opposing elastically deformable retention features that protrude into a lumen of the shaft, define an expandable distal opening of the shaft lumen
Implementation Method 2
the open configuration allows passage of the device holding member through the distal opening of the shaft lumen, and the constricted configuration allows for the aforementioned interlocking engagement of the retention features with the device
Data Source
AI summary
A shaft of an interventional medical system catheter has a distal end formed by opposing elastically deformable retention features that protrude into a lumen of the shaft, and that define an expandable distal opening of the lumen. The retention features secure an implantable medical device to the catheter by an interlocking engagement within a gap defined by a necked-in portion of a device holding member. Each retention feature includes a distal-facing surface defining the distal opening, and, when an elongate release member of the catheter, which extends within the shaft lumen, applies a push force against proximal-facing surfaces of the features, the distal opening expands from a constricted to an open configuration, wherein the open configuration allows passage of the device holding member through the distal opening, and the constricted configuration allows for the interlocking engagement with the device.