Perpendicular Pressure Sensor Mounting on Intravascular Guide Wires
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing intravascular guide wires with pressure sensors suffer from poor mechanical performance and fragile electrical interconnects, limiting their ability to accurately measure intravascular pressure due to the constraints of small diameter and vulnerability to bending and torsional stresses.
Innovation Solution
A flexible elongate member with a core member and an elongated substrate having electrodes and a sensor circuit mounted such that the pressure sensor membrane extends across the width, rather than the length, enhancing thickness, robustness, and durability while maintaining a small outer profile, and featuring a robust interconnect configuration to decouple the sensor from external stresses.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a pressure sensor is incorporated into a guide wire, then intravascular pressure measurement capability is provided, but mechanical performance deteriorates due to bending and torsional stresses
Solution Approach 1:
The guide wire is divided into distinct functional segments: a flexible elongate member for navigation, a core member for structural support, and a separate substrate for the pressure sensor. This segmentation allows each component to be optimized independently, with the sensor substrate being mechanically isolated from bending and torsional stresses while the flexible elongate member handles mechanical navigation requirements.
Solution Approach 2:
A substrate is introduced as an intermediary component between the pressure sensor and the guide wire structure. This substrate mechanically isolates the pressure sensor from bending and torsional stresses transmitted by the flexible elongate member, allowing accurate pressure measurement while maintaining guide wire flexibility and mechanical performance.
2Ease of operation
If the guide wire diameter is reduced for intravascular access, then ease of insertion is improved, but sensor dimensions are constrained leading to poor mechanical performance
Solution Approach 1:
The pressure sensor substrate is oriented with its pressure-sensitive surface facing radially outward in a direction perpendicular to the longitudinal axis of the guide wire, rather than along the length. This dimensional reorientation allows the sensor to measure pressure while being positioned within the constrained diameter, and the substrate can be slightly separated from the guide wire walls to isolate it from mechanical stresses.
3Volume of moving object
If electrical interconnects are made fragile to achieve small sensor dimensions, then device size is reduced, but reliability deteriorates due to vulnerability to failure
Solution Approach 1:
The electrical interconnect system is segmented into robust connections between the pressure sensor terminals and the flexible elongate member conductors. The substrate serves as a separate mechanical platform that can be slightly detached from the guide wire structure, allowing for more reliable electrical connections without compromising the compact size needed for intravascular deployment.
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 configuration improves mechanical performance and durability of intravascular devices, allowing for accurate pressure measurements without compromising the device's mechanical structure and reducing the risk of interconnect failure.
Implementation Method 1
pressure sensor mounted such that a membrane of the pressure sensor extends across a width of the guide wire
Data Source
AI summary
Intravascular devices, systems, and methods are disclosed. In some embodiments, the intravascular devices include at least one pressure sensing component within a distal portion of the device. In that regard, one or more electrical, electronic, optical, and/or electro-optical pressure-sensing components is secured to an elongated substrate such that the pressure-sensing component is mounted perpendicular to a central longitudinal axis of the device. In some implementations, the elongated substrate has a cylindrical profile. Methods of making, assembling, and/or using such intravascular devices and associated systems are also provided.