Profile Altering Tip for Minimally Invasive Heart Valve Delivery
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional open-heart surgery for heart valve replacement is invasive and risky, leading to interest in minimally invasive percutaneous techniques, which require effective delivery systems for prosthetic valves that can navigate through the body with minimal trauma and precise deployment.
Innovation Solution
A delivery system with a tip that transitions from a conical to an expanded profile, allowing for precise delivery and deployment of a radially expandable prosthetic heart valve, featuring a tip profile control assembly that adjusts to facilitate navigation and expansion, providing tactile feedback for accurate positioning.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a tip with a fixed conical profile is used for delivery, then the delivery system can be结构简单 (structurally simple), but the ability to provide tactile feedback and enable precise positioning is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The tip transitions from a compressed conical profile during delivery to an expanded profile during deployment, allowing it to provide tactile feedback to the operator. This dynamic shape change enables precise positioning while maintaining relative structural simplicity during the delivery phase.
Solution Approach 2:
The tip's physical parameters (shape, volume) are changed between delivery and deployment phases. In the compressed state, it has a small conical profile for navigation; in the expanded state, it provides tactile feedback for precise positioning, thus resolving the contradiction between simplicity and precision.
2Ease of operation
If a tip with expanded profile is used throughout delivery, then tactile feedback for positioning is improved, but the ability to navigate through narrow vasculature and deliver minimally invasively is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The tip dynamically changes its profile from compressed to expanded at the appropriate phase. During delivery through narrow vasculature, it maintains a compressed low-profile to minimize trauma. Upon reaching the target, it expands to provide tactile feedback for precise positioning and deployment control.
Solution Approach 2:
The tip is pre-configured in a compressed state for delivery, then transformed to an expanded state at the target site. This preliminary compression allows minimally invasive delivery, while the subsequent expansion provides the necessary tactile feedback for positioning control.
3Manufacturing precision
If the tip transitions from conical to expanded profile, then precise deployment and tactile feedback are achieved, but the device complexity and manufacturing difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The tip utilizes material or structural properties that allow it to change shape between compressed and expanded states. This parameter change enables precise deployment and tactile feedback while the manufacturing process is simplified by using materials or structures (such as shape memory materials or spring-loaded mechanisms) that inherently provide the desired transformation.
Solution Approach 2:
The tip structure is designed to automatically transition between compressed and expanded profiles in response to delivery conditions or operator activation, reducing the need for complex control systems and simplifying manufacturing while maintaining deployment precision.
Data Source
AI summary
A profile altering tip is provided for a delivery system. The tip defines a first profile with a generally conical shape and a second profile with an expanded profile. During use of the delivery system, a tip profile control assembly can alter the tip from the first profile to the second profile.