可吸收血管支架临床试用效果良好

血管支架是一种植入血管狭窄性病变区的金属丝网管状器械,用于治疗冠心病等血管性疾病,进行血管重建手术的植入器械,可支撑动脉血管开启的作用。目前应用的是裸金属支架和药物涂层支架,这两种支架都有导致血栓等风险的缺陷。     

经食道超声心动图对人造心脏瓣膜形态及血流动力学功能的评价

人造心脏瓣膜是治疗瓣膜性心脏病的重要器械,对其功能的评价甚为重要,但经胸超声心动图(TTE)因受显示条件的限制、机械瓣瓣阀强回声声尾的影响,一直未尽人意,只能凭籍一些间接指标来估价人造瓣膜的功能,经食道超声心动图(TEE)通过食道声窗可清楚显示人造瓣膜的结构形态、运转状况以及返流等血流动力学特性,较为直接和确切地提供有关资料,用作临床诊断和治疗中的参考。本文通过对55例人造瓣膜替换术后病人83个人造瓣膜的TEE检查,了解几种类型人造瓣膜的形态学和血流动力学特点,及时发现并发症,从超声心动图角度加深对人造瓣膜有关问题的认识。     

心脏多普勒超声检查

多普勒超声心动图(Dopple Echocardiography)是用超声技术测定心脏及大血管内血流的一种无创性方法。近年来随着仪器的革新,多普勒超声技术迅速发展,已成为心血管病临床常规检查中不可缺少的手段。它可测定心脏和大血管中的血流流速,判断心内分流和瓣膜返流性病变,并可估测狭窄瓣膜的压力价差、心排出量、心内分流量和瓣膜返流量。它与超声显象技术相结合,使超声技术诊断心脏血管病更趋完善。     

组织工程心脏瓣膜的研究进展

组织工程心脏瓣膜(tissue engineering heart valve,TEHV)理论上能克服机械瓣及生物瓣的不足,具有广阔的发展前景。目前组织工程心脏瓣膜的研究主要集中在瓣膜支架材料的选取及制备、种子细胞的选择和种子细胞的种植及培养等三方面。本文将分别就这三方面研究进展进行介绍,分析目前存在的问题,并对其应用进行展望。     

DES早期支架内血栓的形成和防治

目前,冠状动脉内支架植入术是冠心病血运重建的主要方法,支架置入可显著减少再狭窄和靶血管血运重建.虽然支架术后支架内血栓形成少见,但预后差,临床上可表现为急性心肌梗死或猝死.是药物洗脱支架的潜在危险,预防支架内血栓形成是冠状动脉粥样硬化性心脏病介入领域的研究热点和难点,因此,支架内血栓的形成、防治问题仍然值得我们关注与探讨.本文阐明了早期支架内血栓的影响因素,预防,观察方法及治疗措施.使用新一代的药物洗脱支架有望减少支架内血栓的发生.     

兰州飞控仪器总厂—立项新型心脏瓣膜生产线

_,,_。、./J。J、,二,琢现日丁班日在兰州飞控仪器总厂立项。该厂是“人工心脏瓣膜”定点生产厂家,这次立项生产的CL型系列人工心脏瓣膜,用于置换人体心脏内发生病变的心脏瓣膜,使患者重建血液循环动力功能。据悉,该项目拟建设一条年产一万只全炭双叶型人工机械心脏瓣膜生产线,一条年产一万只CL标准和短柱型人工机械心脏瓣膜生产线,以及人工机械心脏瓣膜流体力学及物理兰州飞控仪器总厂——立项新型心脏瓣膜生产线     

冠状动脉支架血流动力学中的几个问题

由于冠状动脉支架介入治疗具有手术创伤小、操作简单、见效快、病人恢复时间短等诸多优点,在治疗心血管动脉粥样硬化或血栓堵塞方面,有逐渐替代外科搭桥手术的趋势。虽然血管支架技术在临床已经有广泛应用,治疗效果也有明显的改善,但是依然存在许多不足需要改进。本文首先回顾了血管支架的发展历程,然后针对血管支架研究中与血流动力学相关的几个待解决的问题进行了论述,以期从血流动力学的角度为血管支架的改进和发展提出建议。     

比伐卢定联合替罗非班在高血栓负荷拟行PPCI治疗的急性ST段抬高型心肌梗死患者中的应用价值

目的:探讨替罗非班与比伐卢定联合治疗在高血栓负荷拟行直接经皮冠状动脉介入(PPCI)的急性ST段抬高型心肌梗死(STEMI)患者中的应用价值。方法:选取我院于2018年3月~2020年3月期间收治的127例高血栓负荷拟行PPCI治疗的STEMI患者。将所有患者按照入院顺序,单号分为对照组(替罗非班治疗),双号分为观察组(比伐卢定联合替罗非班治疗),分别为63例和64例。对比两组术后24 h、术后30 d支架内血栓事件、30 d内的出血事件发生率,对比两组心肌梗死溶栓试验(TIMI)血流分级变化、心功能及肌酸激酶同工酶(CKMB)峰值时间及CKMB峰值,记录两组术后不良心血管事件发生率及住院时间。结果:两组术后24 h、术后30 d均未发生支架内血栓事件,观察组30 d内的出血事件发生率较对照组低(P<0.05)。两组住院时间组间对比无明显差异(P>0.05)。两组术后1个月TIMI血流分级为Ⅲ级的占比高于术前同一分级,TIMI血流分级为0~Ⅰ级、Ⅱ级的占比低于术前同一分级(P<0.05)。观察组术后7 d左心室收缩末期内径(LVESD)、CKMB峰值小于对照组,左心室射血分数(LVEF)高于对照组,CKMB峰值时间短于对照组(P<0.05)。两组心血管不良事件总发生率对比无差异(P>0.05)。结论:比伐卢定联合替罗非班治疗高血栓负荷拟行PPCI的STEMI患者,可改善患者心功能,减少心肌损伤,改善TIMI血流分级,同时还可减少30 d内的出血事件发生率。     

新型血栓抽吸装置在经皮冠脉介入术中的应用

目的:评价新型手工血栓抽吸装置在经皮冠脉介入术中的应用价值。方法:38例冠心病患者在冠脉造影发现病变含有高血栓负荷后,采用新型ZEEK经皮血栓抽吸装置手工抽吸血栓,然后按照常规方法行经皮冠脉介入治疗。术前术后采用冠脉造影TIMI血流分级、心肌灌注显像分级和血栓积分评价血栓抽吸装置的有效性。结果:38例患者中26例患者术前罪犯血管为完全闭塞,12例患者为次全闭塞病变,病变血管血栓抽吸后血栓积分较术前显著下降(3．2±0．7vsl．5±0．2,P＜0．01),冠脉TIMI血流分级显著好转(0．8±0．5vs2．1±0．4,P＜0．01),心肌灌注显像分级显著提高(0．7±0．5vsl．9±0．4,P＜0．01),35例患者即刻植入支架。38例患者在血栓抽吸治疗中无1例出现严重并发症。结论:新型手工血栓抽吸装置可以在急性心肌梗死患者中安全应用,并能有效降低血栓积分,改善冠脉血流,提高支架植入成功率,有助于达到理想的再灌注治疗效果,值得推广应用。     

组织工程方法在人工心脏瓣膜领域中的应用

将组织工程的思想与方法应用于人工心脏瓣膜领域有望克服现有瓣膜的不足,具有良好的应用前景。然而,实现组织工程心脏瓣膜仍然存在许多挑战。该文介绍了组织工程瓣膜的定义及发展,讨论了常用的组织工程瓣膜的材料学研究与制备方法、调控瓣膜再细胞化的手段以及相应的挑战。基于细胞支架、种子细胞、生物活性因子三要素制备的组织工程瓣膜目前大多仅处于基础研究阶段。更具应用推广价值的组织工程瓣膜研究方向是基于异种心包膜或瓣叶交联的组织工程瓣膜,包括提高交联的生物瓣膜的抗钙化性能,制备脱离不良溶剂保存的可预装干燥瓣膜,以及探索新型的生物瓣膜交联方式。     

Numerical and experimental investigations of pulsatile blood flow pattern through a dysfunctional mechanical heart valve

Around 250,000 heart valve replacements are performed every year around the world. Due their higher durability, approximately 2/3 of these replacements use mechanical prosthetic heart valves (mainly bileaflet valves). Although very efficient, these valves can be subject to valve leaflet malfunctions. These malfunctions are usually the consequence of pannus ingrowth and/or thrombus formation and represent serious and potentially fatal complications. Hence, it is important to investigate the flow field downstream of a dysfunctional mechanical heart valve to better understand its impact on blood components (red blood cells, platelets and coagulation factors) and to improve the current diagnosis techniques. Therefore, the objective of this study will be to numerically and experimentally investigate the pulsatile turbulent flow downstream of a dysfunctional bileaflet mechanical heart valve in terms of velocity field, vortex formation and potential negative effect on blood components. The results show that the flow downstream of a dysfunctional valve was characterized by abnormally elevated velocities and shear stresses as well as large scale vortices. These characteristics can predispose to blood components damage. Furthermore, valve malfunction led to an underestimation of maximal transvalvular pressure gradient, using Doppler echocardiography, when compared to numerical results. This could be explained by the shifting of the maximal velocity towards the normally functioning leaflet. As a consequence, clinicians should try, when possible, to check the maximal velocity position not only at the central orifice but also through the lateral orifices. Finding the maximal velocity in the lateral orifice could be an indication of valve dysfunction.     

Comparison of first and second heart sounds after mechanical heart valve replacement

In this article, the spectral features of first heart sounds (S1) and second heart sounds (S2), which comprise the mechanical heart valve sounds obtained after aortic valve replacement (AVR) and mitral valve replacement (MVR), are compared to find out the effect of mechanical heart valve replacement and recording area on S1 and S2. For this aim, the Welch method and the autoregressive (AR) method are applied on the S1 and S2 taken from 66 recordings of 8 patients with AVR and 98 recordings from 11 patients with MVR, thereby yielding power spectrum of the heart sounds. Three features relating to frequency of heart sounds and three features relating to energy of heart sounds are obtained. Results show that in comparison to natural heart valves, mechanical heart valves contain higher frequency components and energy, and energy and frequency components do not show common behaviour for either AVR or MVR depending on the recording areas. Aside from the frequency content and energy of the sound generated by mechanical heart valves being affected by the structure of the lungs–thorax and the recording areas, the pressure across the valve incurred during AVR or MVR is a significant factor in determining the frequency and energy levels of the valve sound produced. Though studies on native heart sounds as a non-invasive diagnostic method has been done for many years, it is observed that studies on mechanical heart valves sounds are limited. The results of this paper will contribute to other studies on using a non-invasive method for assessing the mechanical heart valve sounds.     

Unsteady effects on the flow across tilting disk valves

The present study simulates numerically the flow across two-dimensional tilting disk models of mechanical heart valves. The time-dependent Navier-Stokes equations are solved to assess the importance of unsteady effects in the fully open position of the valve. Flow cases with steady or physiological inflow conditions and with fixed or moving valves are solved. The simulations lead into mixed conclusions. It is obvious that steady inflow cases that account for vortex shedding only cannot model realistic physiological cases. In cases with imposed physiological inflow, the details of the flow field for fixed and moving valves might differ in the fully open position as well, although the gross features are quite similar. The fixed valve case consistently results in safe estimations of several critical quantities such as the axial force, the maximal shear stress on the valve, or the transvalvular pressure drop. Thus, fixed valve simulations can provide useful information for the design of prosthetic heart valves, as long as the properties in the fully open position only are sought.     

Fluid-structure interaction simulation of artificial textile reinforced aortic heart valve: Validation with an in-vitro test

Prosthetic heart valves deployed in the left heart (aortic and mitral) are subjected to harsh hemodynamical conditions. Most of the tissue engineered heart valves have been developed for the low pressure pulmonary position because of the difficulties in fabricating a mechanically strong valve, able to withstand the systemic circulation. This necessitates the use of reinforcing scaffolds, resulting in a tissue-engineered textile reinforced tubular aortic heart valve. Therefore, to better design these implants, material behaviour of the composite, valve kinematics and its hemodynamical response need to be evaluated. Experimental assessment can be immensely time consuming and expensive, paving way for numerical studies. In this work, the material properties obtained using the previously proposed multi-scale numerical method for textile composites was evaluated for its accuracy. An in silico immersed boundary (IB) fluid structure interaction (FSI) simulation emulating the in vitro experiment was set-up to evaluate and compare the geometric orifice area and flow rate for one beat cycle. Results from the in silico FSI simulation were found to be in good coherence with the in vitro test during the systolic phase, while mean deviation of approximately 9% was observed during the diastolic phase of a beat cycle. Merits and demerits of the in silico IB-FSI method for the presented case study has been discussed with the advantages outweighing the drawbacks, indicating the potential towards an effective use of this framework in the development and analysis of heart valves.     

Transplantation of Pulmonary Valve Using a Mouse Model of Heterotopic Heart Transplantation

Tissue engineered heart valves, especially decellularized valves, are starting to gain momentum in clinical use of reconstructive surgery with mixed results. However, the cellular and molecular mechanisms of the neotissue development, valve thickening, and stenosis development are not researched extensively. To answer the above questions, we developed a murine heterotopic heart valve transplantation model. A heart valve was harvested from a valve donor mouse and transplanted to a heart donor mouse. The heart with a new valve was transplanted heterotopically to a recipient mouse. The transplanted heart showed its own heartbeat, independent of the recipient’s heartbeat. The blood flow was quantified using a high frequency ultrasound system with a pulsed wave Doppler. The flow through the implanted pulmonary valve showed forward flow with minimal regurgitation and the peak flow was close to 100 mm/sec. This murine model of heart valve transplantation is highly versatile, so it can be modified and adapted to provide different hemodynamic environments and/or can be used with various transgenic mice to study neotissue development in a tissue engineered heart valve.     

Effect of systolic flow rate on the prediction of effective prosthetic valve orifice area

The Gorlin equation for the hemodynamic assessment of valve area is commonly used in cardiac catheterization laboratories. A study was performed to test the prediction capabilities of the Gorlin formula as well as the Aaslid and Gabbay formula for the effective orifice area of prosthetic heart valves. Pressure gradient, flow, and valve opening area measurements were performed on four 27 mm valve prostheses (two mechanical bileaflet designs, St. Jude and Edwards-Duromedics, an Edwards pericardial tissue valve, and a trileaflet polyurethane valve) each mounted in the aortic position of an in vitro pulse duplicator. With the known valve orifice area, a different discharge coefficient was computed for each of the four valves and three orifice area formulas. After some theoretical considerations, it was proposed that the discharge coefficient would be a function of the flow rate through the valve. All discharge coefficients were observed to increase with increasing systolic flow rate. An empirical relationship of discharge coefficient as a linear function of systolic flow rate was determined through a regression analysis, with a different relationship for each valve and each orifice area formula. Using this relationship in the orifice area formulas improved the accuracy of the prediction of the effective orifice area with all three formulas performing equally well.     

A detailed fluid mechanics study of tilting disk mechanical heart valve closure and the implications to blood damage

Hemolysis and thrombosis are among the most detrimental effects associated with mechanical heart valves. The strength and structure of the flows generated by the closure of mechanical heart valves can be correlated with the extent of blood damage. In this in vitro study, a tilting disk mechanical heart valve has been modified to measure the flow created within the valve housing during the closing phase. This is the first study to focus on the region just upstream of the mitral valve occluder during this part of the cardiac cycle, where cavitation is known to occur and blood damage is most severe. Closure of the tilting disk valve was studied in a "single shot" chamber driven by a pneumatic pump. Laser Doppler velocimetry was used to measure all three velocity components over a 30 ms period encompassing the initial valve impact and rebound. An acrylic window placed in the housing enabled us to make flow measurements as close as 200 microm away from the closed occluder. Velocity profiles reveal the development of an atrial vortex on the major orifice side of the valve shed off the tip of the leaflet. The vortex strength makes this region susceptible to cavitation. Mean and maximum axial velocities as high as 7 ms and 20 ms were recorded, respectively. At closure, peak wall shear rates of 80,000 s(-1) were calculated close to the valve tip. The region of the flow examined here has been identified as a likely location of hemolysis and thrombosis in tilting disk valves. The results of this first comprehensive study measuring the flow within the housing of a tilting disk valve may be helpful in minimizing the extent of blood damage through the combined efforts of experimental and computational fluid dynamics to improve mechanical heart valve designs.     

A computational procedure for prediction of structural effects of edge-to-edge repair on mitral valve

Edge-to-edge technique is a surgical procedure for the correction of mitral valve leaflets prolapse by suturing the edge of the prolapsed leaflet to the free edge of the opposing one. Suture presence modifies valve mechanical behavior and orifice flow area in the diastolic phase, when the valve opens and blood flows into the ventricle. In the present work, in order to support identification of potentially critical conditions, a computational procedure is described to evaluate the effects of changing suture length and position in combination with valve size and shape. The procedure is based on finite element method analyses applied to a range of different mitral valves, investigating for each configuration the influence of repair on functional parameters, such as mitral valve orifice area and transvalvular pressure gradient, and on structural parameters, such as stress in the leaflets and stitch tension. This kind of prediction would ideally require a coupled fluid-structural analysis, where the interactions between blood flows and mitral apparatus deformation are simultaneously considered. In the present study, however, an alternative approach is proposed, in which results obtained by purely structural finite element analyses are elaborated and interpreted taking into account the Bernoulli type equations available in literature to describe blood flow through mitral orifice. In this way, the effects of each parameter in terms of orifice flow area, suture loads, and leaflets stresses can be expressed as functions of atrioventricular pressure gradient and then correlated to blood flow rate. Results obtained by using this procedure for different configurations are finally discussed.     

Tomographic PIV in a model of the left ventricle: 3D flow past biological and mechanical heart valves

Left ventricular flow is intrinsically complex, three-dimensional and unsteady. Its features are susceptible to cardiovascular pathology and treatment, in particular to surgical interventions involving the valves (mitral valve replacement). To improve our understanding of intraventricular fluid mechanics and the impact of various types of prosthetic valves thereon, we have developed a custom-designed versatile left ventricular phantom with anatomically realistic moving left ventricular membrane. A biological, a tilting disc and a bileaflet valve (in two different orientations) were mounted in the mitral position and tested under the same settings. To investigate 3D flow within the phantom, a four-view tomographic particle image velocimetry setup has been implemented. The results compare side-by-side the evolution of the 3D flow topology, vortical structures and kinetic energy in the left ventricle domain during the cardiac cycle. Except for the tilting disc valve, all tested prosthetic valves induced a crossed flow path, where the outflow crosses the inflow path, passing under the mitral valve. The biological valve shows a strong jet with a peak velocity about twice as high compared to all mechanical heart valves, which makes it easier to penetrate deeply into the cavity. Accordingly, the peak kinetic energy in the left ventricle in case of the biological valve is about four times higher than the mechanical heart valves. We conclude that the tomographic particle imaging velocimetry setup provides a useful ground truth measurement of flow features and allows a comparison of the effects of different valve types on left ventricular flow patterns.     

Particle Image Velocimetry Study of Pulsatile Flow in Bi-leaflet Mechanical Heart Valves with Image Compensation Method

Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) is an important technique in studying blood flow in heart valves. Previous PIV studies of flow around prosthetic heart valves had different research concentrations, and thus never provided the physical flow field pictures in a complete heart cycle, which compromised their pertinence for a better understanding of the valvular mechanism. In this study, a digital PIV (DPIV) investigation was carried out with improved accuracy, to analyse the pulsatile flow field around the bi-leaflet mechanical heart valve (MHV) in a complete heart cycle. For this purpose a pulsatile flow test rig was constructed to provide the necessary in vitro test environment, and the flow field around a St. Jude size 29 bi-leaflet MHV and a similar MHV model were studied under a simulated physiological pressure waveform with flow rate of 5.2 l/min and pulse rate at 72 beats/min. A phase-locking method was applied to gate the dynamic process of valve leaflet motions. A special image-processing program was applied to eliminate optical distortion caused by the difference in refractive indexes between the blood analogue fluid and the test section. Results clearly showed that, due to the presence of the two leaflets, the valvular flow conduit was partitioned into three flow channels. In the opening process, flow in the two side channels was first to develop under the presence of the forward pressure gradient. The flow in the central channel was developed much later at about the mid-stage of the opening process. Forward flows in all three channels were observed at the late stage of the opening process. At the early closing process, a backward flow developed first in the central channel. Under the influence of the reverse pressure gradient, the flow in the central channel first appeared to be disturbed, which was then transformed into backward flow. The backward flow in the central channel was found to be the main driving factor for the leaflet rotation in the valve closing process. After the valve was fully closed, local flow activities in the proximity of the valve region persisted for a certain time before slowly dying out. In both the valve opening and closing processes, maximum velocity always appeared near the leaflet trailing edges. The flow field features revealed in the present paper improved our understanding of valve motion mechanism under physiological conditions, and this knowledge is very helpful in designing the new generation of MHVs.