First Heartless Man - You Don't Really Need A Heart or A Pulse

Originally posted by westcoast
reply to post by Fopicon

 

ETA: I gotta add this because a lot of people have commented while i was researching. This article is very MISLEADING. Please read on to find out why......

Welcome to ATS!

This is in no way a strike against ya, because your linked article is recent....but the story is NOT!! I did some searching and found some better info on this. First, here is the original article from the Texas Heart Institute that gives the complete story. It is from March of last year:

Texas Heart Institute

Second...here is a follow-up article from June of last year. The patient later died from his other illnesses. Also, this device is a long ways off (still) from being a replacement to heart transplants. It is externally powered AND controlled....it needs a console to run it!

June 2011 follow-up article

"It is a good life-saving pump, but the limitation of it is that it is externally powered and externally driven, and it requires a large console," said Frazier. "So, if we are really going to impact the premature death from heart failure, we have to have a pump that is implantable and can replace the heart."

So while it is a milestone....it is still a long ways away from being used except in very extreme cases where the person is waiting for a transplant.

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

Um-yah. People need to read my above post. The article is misleading. No fault of the OPs/

Can they fit a thermostat so you can stay warm in winter ?

Peace

reply to post by westcoast


Um,westcoast,they just simply ignored it because it didn't fit in with the pattern of their thoughts.

While I have moral quams with this, I am very happy to see that we can move past the organ donation list game. Perhaps they'll devise a full system of artificial organs. This is amazing!

This tech is mainstream now. Medical heart procedures seem futuristic now. My grandmother just had her bloodflow bypassed from her heart to electic pumps. She has to wear two battery packs on her hip and recharge them daily. I think the surgery costs more than a house. 13 hour surgery with a team of surgens. We are at the point where we do not need hearts. Now its just pumps batteries and really large sums of money.

Agreed, at no fault of the OP this whole thing is misleading.

The heart is a pump and all they did is replace one pump with another, nothing more.

Judging by the pictures in the OP's article this guy will have absolutely no quality of life. Looked like he had a trach as well. This man will be in the hospital for the rest of his short life.

Neat tech but we have a long way to go. I have a patient in our local area with an LVAD (Left Ventricular Assist Device) which is essentially a last ditch attempt to keep someone alive while they wait for a heart transplant. Looks like the device in the OP is along the same lines. Same thing, no radial pulses are palpable and it is very hard to auscultate any heart beat.

Kind of makes things difficult for the EMTs and Paramedics in the field to treat.

reply to post by Fopicon


yeah, that Dick Cheney guy,

he had one installed when his original one withered into a small black mass...

after being in charge of the command center on 911

Former Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta was there & testified as to the cold heartless bastard refusing to allow any planes to be engaged as standard protocol mandated... ya know.. before Cheney changed protocol & permission needed to be passed through him..

I guess we know what Dick Cheney's next upgrade is going to be, right?

He's a cyborg.

More likely a temporary replacement until a suitable human donor heart can be found.

One thing concerns me though and that is how the doctors dismiss the need for a beating heart.

I would have thought there is a reason why the heart beats the way it does, considering every organism that has a heart, as far as I'm aware of, has a beating one.

kind of reminds me of the Soviet Dead Dog experiments. Maybe that is where they got their inspiration?

www.youtube.com...

Stepping into the spotlight on a pitch black stage grabbing the mic and slamming it close to my face I cry out, I howl, the first verse...

"In the Year 2525 if man is still alive....if woman can survive they may find..

Remember This Guy

www.google.com... s_sm=s&gs_upl=37871l40372l0l42686l2l2l0l0l0l0l123l208l1.1l2l0

He does have a heart! It's just mechanical is all.

sooner or later we are going to live with no heart at all

hey im ready

seems to me we aren't too far off from a full redesign of the vascular/digestive/and other systems in the body to a more mechanical and maintainable medium.

Its time I think...a slow conversion over to a cyborg is optimal. wonky hearts, soft and flawed lungs, etc...toss the whole lot and lets do some science (but start on pigs first...)

Originally posted by The Ghost Who Walks
More likely a temporary replacement until a suitable human donor heart can be found.

One thing concerns me though and that is how the doctors dismiss the need for a beating heart.

I would have thought there is a reason why the heart beats the way it does, considering every organism that has a heart, as far as I'm aware of, has a beating one.

Well, its not so much beating as it is pumping through contractions...the beat is an elegant solution to keep things moving.
if you have a machine that pushes through, then the pump becomes unnecessary.
like old school wells of pushing the level up and down replaced with a garden hose

Ugh. Misleading title. He DOES have a heart. Just not a real one... Like Cheney.

Wow....S&F!

Next thing you know we won't even need brains! amazing find op

I just would be afraid if that thing got clogged or just stopped working...

I hope they can do this for lungs too. I have asthma

Originally posted by westcoast
reply to post by Fopicon

 

ETA: I gotta add this because a lot of people have commented while i was researching. This article is very MISLEADING. Please read on to find out why......

Welcome to ATS!

This is in no way a strike against ya, because your linked article is recent....but the story is NOT!! I did some searching and found some better info on this. First, here is the original article from the Texas Heart Institute that gives the complete story. It is from March of last year:

Texas Heart Institute

Second...here is a follow-up article from June of last year. The patient later died from his other illnesses. Also, this device is a long ways off (still) from being a replacement to heart transplants. It is externally powered AND controlled....it needs a console to run it!

June 2011 follow-up article

"It is a good life-saving pump, but the limitation of it is that it is externally powered and externally driven, and it requires a large console," said Frazier. "So, if we are really going to impact the premature death from heart failure, we have to have a pump that is implantable and can replace the heart."

So while it is a milestone....it is still a long ways away from being used except in very extreme cases where the person is waiting for a transplant.

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

edit on 4-2-2012 by westcoast because: (no reason given)

This needs another bump.

It's amazing technology, but not quite what some people are assuming.