Leakage Characteristics of the St. Jude Heart Valve

by Theresa E. Brandner, St. Jude Medical Inc, St. Paul, United States,
Yi-Ren Woo, St. Jude Medical Inc, St. Paul, United States,



Document Type: Proceeding Paper

Part of: Engineering Mechanics

Abstract:

The requirement for anticoagulant therapy in patients implanted with mechanical heart valve prostheses is well known. A plausible explanation for this requirement is that the leakage flow through these prosthetic devices may induce shear stresses which are high enough to damage blood elements, leading to clot formation (thrombus). This study comprehensively investigates a method of studying the clearance area between the valve orifice and occluders so that a relationship may be established between the valve dimensions and the leakage area distribution. These results will in turn be used in a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis of the stresses experienced by the blood elements; further conclusions may be made as to the overall impact that valvular leakage through prosthetic devices imposes on blood elements.

Subject Headings: Valves | Computational fluid dynamics technique | Fluid mechanics | Fluid flow | Fluid dynamics | Stress analysis | Shear stress

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