Electrophysiology Mapping Catheter with Imaging Hood
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional imaging modalities for visualizing tissue regions within body lumens, such as the heart, face challenges due to opaque bodily fluids like blood, which obstruct clear imaging and limit the ability to perform real-time therapeutic procedures, and existing devices often require inflation, leading to tissue displacement and unstable imaging conditions.
Innovation Solution
A tissue imaging and manipulation apparatus featuring a deployment catheter with an expandable imaging hood that uses a transparent fluid to displace blood, allowing for clear visualization and therapeutic interventions, while being stabilized through inflatable balloons or tissue anchors, and equipped with sensors for electrophysiological mapping.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If an inflatable balloon is used for imaging, then the imaging area is created and stabilized, but the balloon requires inflation to large size which displaces surrounding tissue and creates unsteady conditions under pressure changes
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the imaging function from a large inflatable balloon structure and concentrates it into a small imaging catheter with a distal sensor array. This allows imaging to be performed without requiring large-scale inflation that would displace tissue, while maintaining stable imaging conditions through the localized catheter design.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a clear fluid as an intermediary medium between the imaging sensor and the tissue. This fluid displaces blood and other opaque substances from the imaging field, providing optical clarity without requiring mechanical inflation of large structures that would cause tissue displacement.
2Loss of information
If a clear fluid is introduced to displace blood, then optical clarity is achieved for imaging, but the system complexity increases with fluid delivery mechanisms
Solution Approach 1:
The imaging catheter is designed with multi-functionality, integrating both imaging sensors and clear fluid delivery capabilities into a single device. This allows the same catheter structure to perform both optical imaging and fluid-mediated clearance functions, reducing overall system complexity compared to separate devices.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent merges the imaging function and the fluid delivery function into a single integrated catheter assembly. The imaging sensor array and fluid delivery lumens are combined in one device, eliminating the need for separate imaging and fluid management systems.
3Measurement precision
If position sensors are used to map cardiac tissue, then electrical activity and movement can be detected, but sufficient sampling points require extensive mapping time
Solution Approach 1:
The patent enables continuous data acquisition through the distal sensor array as the catheter moves through the cardiac chamber. Rather than requiring discrete sampling at fixed positions, the continuous sensor array captures electrical activity and positional information along its entire length, maintaining high measurement precision while reducing the time needed to map extensive tissue areas.
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
Enables real-time, undistorted imaging of tissue regions within body lumens filled with opaque media, facilitating precise therapeutic procedures by maintaining a clear imaging field and providing tools for direct visualization and manipulation.
Implementation Method 1
uses a transparent fluid to displace blood, allowing for clear visualization
Implementation Method 2
stabilized through inflatable balloons
Implementation Method 3
detecting any electrophysiological activity of the visualized tissue regions
Data Source
AI summary
A system comprises a catheter and an electromagnetic sensor assembly supported at a distal end of the catheter. The electromagnetic sensor assembly includes a magnetic strut spirally extended away from the distal end of the catheter around an open area distal of the catheter. The system also comprises an imaging element supported at a distal end of the catheter inside the open area. The imaging element acquires an image of the tissue surface region. The system also comprises a processor that receives a position of the electromagnetic sensor assembly and the tissue surface image. The processor maps the position of the electromagnetic sensor assembly and tissue surface image together. The system also comprises a barrier reconfigurable from a low-profile shape to an expanded deployment shape projecting from a distal end of the catheter. The electromagnetic sensor assembly is spirally configured over the barrier.