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LVADs are implanted in your chest. Blood doesn't leave your body, but do they have external batteries. You have a wire coming out of your chest (or neck/head,

LVADs are implanted in your chest. Blood doesn't leave your body, but do they have external batteries. You have a wire coming out of your chest (or neck/head, sometimes) which is a constant infection worry. AFAIK the only external pumps are like, countertop kind of things. They're ideally a stopgap, but even still it's typically a massive change in quality of life. The left ventricle is what feeds your entire body blood; the right ventricle only feeds the lungs. When the left ventricle fails, blood backs up and starts overflowing into the lung space. It's exceptionally unpleasant. The right ventricle is usually in much better shape so an LVAD can be almost like having a functioning transplant except for the risk of infection.

faeyanpiraat 5y ago
Well, half of your hearth failing being "exceptionally unpleasant" is not a surprise. Anyways, wouldn't it be feasible to use wireless power transfer?
- hwillis 5y ago
  It is, and it has even been done. One large limitation is that it's not a great idea to have batteries inside the body. An LVAD is intrinsically liquid-cooled; batteries are not. Ruggedly encapsulating a battery means it is fairly well-insulated and can get warm. Batteries also fail pretty unpredictably- they're fundamentally dozens of square feet of very thin film, and it's very difficult to ensure that every battery is perfect. But again, it has been done. Implanting a couple medium-size batteries and the circuitry+magnet for wireless charging is pretty robust to failure, but consider actually making that decision for yourself. You're already accepting huge restrictions, so is the wire that much of an extra burden? Realistically, if the LVAD loses power, you're dead. It's not like suffocating; without bloodflow (even blood without oxygen!) your brain will die in about two minutes. Chest compressions probably won't even help. You got the LVAD because your heart couldn't pump, and chest compressions will not force blood through the LVAD. Even if this happens in the emergency room your odds are not good. Cutting open a chest to hand-crank a human is not easy. Pulling an ECMO machine and inserting the massive catheters is not easy. You might die while the machine is still rolling towards you.
  - rmak 5y ago
    I thought your real heart kind of recovered a bit since it wasn't going through the workload.

faeyanpiraat 5y ago

Well, half of your hearth failing being "exceptionally unpleasant" is not a surprise. Anyways, wouldn't it be feasible to use wireless power transfer?

hwillis 5y ago
It is, and it has even been done. One large limitation is that it's not a great idea to have batteries inside the body. An LVAD is intrinsically liquid-cooled; batteries are not. Ruggedly encapsulating a battery means it is fairly well-insulated and can get warm. Batteries also fail pretty unpredictably- they're fundamentally dozens of square feet of very thin film, and it's very difficult to ensure that every battery is perfect. But again, it has been done. Implanting a couple medium-size batteries and the circuitry+magnet for wireless charging is pretty robust to failure, but consider actually making that decision for yourself. You're already accepting huge restrictions, so is the wire that much of an extra burden? Realistically, if the LVAD loses power, you're dead. It's not like suffocating; without bloodflow (even blood without oxygen!) your brain will die in about two minutes. Chest compressions probably won't even help. You got the LVAD because your heart couldn't pump, and chest compressions will not force blood through the LVAD. Even if this happens in the emergency room your odds are not good. Cutting open a chest to hand-crank a human is not easy. Pulling an ECMO machine and inserting the massive catheters is not easy. You might die while the machine is still rolling towards you.
- rmak 5y ago
  I thought your real heart kind of recovered a bit since it wasn't going through the workload.