• Question: Have you designed any important machines to help peoples hearts? If not what have you done?

    Asked by FinnickTheCrab to Tommy on 28 Apr 2020.
    • Photo: Tommy Hayden

      Tommy Hayden answered on 28 Apr 2020:

      The project I’m working on now is a machine to help treat a specific heart problem but can’t go into it in much detail because it’s still being designed

      The first project I worked on in Medtronic was for a product that burned a nerve in people’s kidneys to help reduce blood pressure (there is a nervous loop between kidney, brain and heart that impacts blood pressure)

      After that I worked on a project where skin from a pig’s heart was used to create a heart valve that could be inserted into a patient’s heart using a catheter that’s inserted through their leg (sounds a bit rough but it’s far better than having rib cage split for open heart surgery…). Patients are typically back on their feet the next day (if not same day as treatment) using this approach

      Then I worked on a stent project. Stents are wire frames that can be inserted via arm or leg to keep blocked arteries opened. I’ve seen a few of these get implanted. The patient is very comfortable during these procedures – all done in about 30 mins. It seems similar to getting a tooth filled – again, much better than getting chest opened…

      The machine I’m working on now is to treat blockages that can’t be treated using stents

Comments

  • Photo: Eddie

    Eddie commented on :

    Great question FinnickTheCrab and equally great answer Tommy.

    I too work in designing devices for treating heart valves. Specifically, I design the catheters, that Tommy mentioned, for putting the new heart valves into peoples hearts. We call this a ‘Delivery Catheter System’.

    The last one of these I designed was for a heart valve to treat a patient whose pulmonary valve (that’s the one between the right ventricle and the lungs) is damaged from birth. Unfortunately, many kids around the World around are born each year with parts of their heart not formed properly or working properly. We call these ‘Congenital Heart Defects’.

    It makes me very proud to think that something we’ve invented might some day be used to help people get better and maybe even save someone’s life! Hope that helps answer your question FinnicktheCrab – keep asking great questions!