Wireless charger could power tiny heart pump

Wireless charger could power tiny heart pump
CNET News May 4, 2012 5:32 PM PDT

We may have a breakthrough in battery charging for heart pumps !!

Engineering students at Rice University have apparently found a way to charge a battery wirelessly !!

Very Cool

With more patients needing heart transplants than there are hearts available, a tiny heart pump called a ventricular assist device (VAD) can be a lifesaver. But the pump, which is inserted into the aorta via a catheter that helps blood flow, requires wiring leads that run out of the patient's body to a battery pack, and this setup can easily result in infection.

The device uses an alternating magnetic field on the exterior unit to create alternating current on a second coil under the skin to power the pump.

So a team of computer and electrical engineering students at Rice University have devised a method to power the VAD without wires breaking through the skin.

The team used a small coil and a battery inserted a centimeter beneath the skin at waist-level, which in turn uses wires to power the VAD. They then added a belt-mounted external battery and coil that uses an alternating magnetic field to create alternating current in the subcutaneous coil, thus wirelessly charging the embedded battery.

Rice University seniors have developed an implantable battery and charger to power a heart pump without breaking through the skin. Skin no barrier for cardiac charger

Very very good to know this, I hope we can do away with this sort of thing all together one day, our bodies are well equipped with energy, maybe one day the mechanics will be able to use it.

It sends shivers down my spine and makes me feel icky to know that in this day and age, people need wires running out of their body connected to vital organs.

It's like that kid in Australia years ago, who suffered major head injury and had to have 3/4 of his skull removed. Instead of FIXING IT, the useless idiots just gave him a bike helmet. His head was basically his brain and skin. You could touch his forehead and see the entire cavity move in response. It took MONTHS of this and a news item for some idiot politician to say they'd look into why he's not been looked at sooner.

Wires hanging off your heart. Imagine what sort of inhuman scum already exist, and then imagine yourself confronted by them in a robbery situation. Yank.... youre dead.

We're so fragile. Our minds are not even safe. Brain trauma can turn a god fearing and loving person into a heartless uncaring swine. I've seen that. People think they are who they are because they KNOW themselves. But you're nothing more than chemical reactions to electrical charges. Anything else is repetition and familiarity, stored in parts of the brain. So many things can go wrong with our bodies....

It's a wonder we manage at all to survive.

One spark of electricity at the wrong time, not only do you die, but the brains of others are impacted by this knowledge and suffering occurs. We're so fragile...

This is old technology.

I had a toothbrush about 15 years ago that would charge without contacts in exactly the same principle(Inductive coils).


The big issue here is the containment of the battery cells. Rechargeable batteries have a limited life before being prone to leakage. This is why they usually use nuclear batteries in pacemakers.

Originally posted by OccamAssassin
This is old technology.

Very.
I'm not sure why they used the word "breakthrough", apart from being the usual journalistic sensationalism.
Maybe the journalist was genuinely ignorant of how old this idea is.

Electromagnetic induction goes all the way back to 1831.

Originally posted by alfa1

Originally posted by OccamAssassin
This is old technology.

Very.
I'm not sure why they used the word "breakthrough", apart from being the usual journalistic sensationalism.
Maybe the journalist was genuinely ignorant of how old this idea is.

Electromagnetic induction goes all the way back to 1831.

Not sure this is fair. Why have there been no 'rechargable' heart motors then? There has to be something to it in order for the news to be made, combining the problem of powering artificial devices for humans?

I mean, you dont have to plug grand pa into the socket over night, he has to have a battery that is strapped to his body externally.

Something somewhere is amiss here.

Originally posted by mainidh
Not sure this is fair. Why have there been no 'rechargable' heart motors then?

Its probably a safety thing.
The Rice Uni. article linked says that the internal battery only lasts 3 hours.

Q. What if your battery charger fails?
A. You die in less than 3 hours unless you can get a new one from somewhere.

Not sure I'd trust a battery charger that much.