Medical Balloon with Variable Wall Thickness for Vascular Navigation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Medical balloons face challenges in navigating tortuous and narrow bodily vessels due to limited flexibility and trackability, which affects their ability to effectively administer treatments like angioplasty and stent delivery.
Innovation Solution
A medical balloon design featuring multiple layers of varying thickness and composition, where the inner layer is stiffer and thicker in the body portion for strength and burst pressure, and thinner and more flexible in the cone and waist portions for enhanced trackability and flexibility, allowing for improved navigation through complex vascular paths.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If the balloon is made with uniform thickness throughout, then manufacturing is simple, but flexibility and trackability in tortuous vessels are limited
Solution Approach 1:
The balloon incorporates varying wall thickness across different regions: the body portion has greater thickness for strength and burst pressure, while the cone and waist portions have reduced thickness for enhanced flexibility and trackability. This local variation in structural properties allows the balloon to navigate tortuous vascular paths effectively while maintaining operational integrity during inflation.
2Reliability
If the balloon wall is made thicker for strength and burst pressure, then reliability improves, but flexibility and ability to navigate tortuous paths deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The balloon wall thickness is optimized locally: the body portion maintains greater thickness to withstand inflation pressures and prevent bursting, ensuring reliability during the therapeutic procedure. Conversely, the cone and waist portions feature reduced thickness to provide the flexibility needed for navigating tortuous vascular anatomy, thus resolving the contradiction between strength and trackability.
3Ease of operation
If the balloon has varying thickness regions, then flexibility and navigation capability improve, but manufacturing precision requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The balloon is divided into distinct segments with different thickness characteristics: a body portion with greater thickness for strength, and cone/waist portions with reduced thickness for flexibility. This segmentation approach allows each region to be optimized for its specific function while maintaining manufacturability through controlled extrusion or molding processes that can produce varying wall thicknesses in different zones.
Data Source
AI summary
Medical devices, such as medical balloons, and methods of making the devices, are disclosed. In some embodiments, the balloons include a portion, e.g., a layer, that varies in thickness.