Could A Printer Be Your Heart Donor?

Do you ever wonder when the future will get here? Where are all the hover boards, jet packs, and magical cancer cures.

Just because you don't hear about them every day, doesn't mean there aren't new scientific discoveries being made.

I'm sure you have the latest news on the newest smart phone, tablet, or car, but what about advances in the medical field.

Well, if you haven't heard yet artificial organs are being researched with great success.

Artificial organs are just one of the coolest topics being researched.

Who would have thought that you could 3D print liver cells to help damaged livers regrow?

How about a hip replacement that is made specifically for the shape and size of your hip joint?

Surgeons have even saved countess lives by 3D printing organs for practice before a complicated surgery.

Now that we know it's possible to 3D print artificial organs for surgery practice, when are we going to have artificial organs available for implants?

Actually...we already do.

Since 1969 there have been a total of 13 artificial heart prototypes, although only 2 of them have been approved by the FDA.

Though they are for temporary use, artificial hearts have been used to keep patients stable and out of the hospital until a heart becomes available.

The most exciting artificial heart is called SynCardia. It is the lightest artificial heart available and it can replace both the ventricles and the four heart valves.

While most other artificial heart prototypes can weigh as much as 4 times what a real heart weighs, the SynCardia weighs about 1/3 of what your heart weighs.

SynCardia even has two different sizes of artificial hearts. One is specially made for smaller women and teenagers.

The SynCardia is by far the most advanced artificial heart available. It eliminates a number of heart problems like arrhythmias, failing ventricles, and malfunctioning heart valves.

In fact, it's so reliable that the longest a patient has been supported by SynCardia is 1,374 days. That's almost 4 years of extra time to wait for an available heart.

A historic landmark has been reached recently with the SynCardia. The first surgery to successfully bridge the SynCardia to a real heart has been performed.

A woman named Nemah Kahala was implanted with the SynCardia after she suffered heart failure so advanced that repair surgery and mechanical assist devices could not help her.

She had emergency surgery to implant the SynCardia and just 2 weeks after the surgery she was strong enough to be placed on the transplant list.

When a heart was found, she went into surgery again to remove the SynCardia and replace it with a donor heart.

Because there are many people on the transplant list and so few hearts available, it is almost impossible to find a heart for everyone before their time is up.

An artificial heart gives people significantly more time before the need for a heart transplant becomes urgent.

An extension of the waiting period relieves hospitals of the pressure that having so few available hearts has placed on them.

Welcome to the future!

 

 

Lee Daniels, Princeton Nutrients Staff

Princeton Nutrients develops and distributes products to help you maintain a healthy body as you age. Every batch of product that comes out of our state-of-the-art production facility is sent to a third-party lab for testing. When it comes to your health, we hold ourselves to a higher standard.

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Posted in: Health,Technology by Guest Author on October 28, 2015 @ 2:15 am

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