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Cardiovascular disease is the number one cause of death in the United States. Nearly 550,000 new cases are diagnosed each year, with nearly 5 million Americans living with congestive heart failure. Development and implementation of new medical devices and technologies is essential not only to keep American medical centers at the forefront of innovative health care delivery, but also to reduce health care costs by earlier and more accurate diagnosis and more effective treatment of this disease. In response to this need, Foster-Miller and the Cleveland Clinic Foundation are developing a family of magnetically levitated blood pumping systems to meet the full range of patient needs.
These systems include pulsatile and rotary left ventricle assist devices (VADs), a total artificial heart (TAH), and an intravascular catheter pump for use as a cardiac-assist device or a permanently implantable, miniature RVAD. Innovation in electromagnetics distinguishes these efforts to develop new technology for blood pumps and includes both magnetic actuation (the MagScrew actuator) and magnetic suspension systems.
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