THE ITALIAN ARTIFICIAL-HEART PROGRAM

In Italy, artificial heart development was promoted by virtue of a spe cial program on technological and industrial development in areas rela ted to cardiology and cardiosurgery. A first prototype series of elect romechanical total artificial hearts (TAHs) and ventricular assist dev ices (VADs), with ball-screw-based actuation technology, has been deve loped, and preliminary bench tests and short-term animal implant exper iments were performed. The project started with analysis and developme nt of existing TAH and VAD models, and it included a fill-sensor-free control scheme and anatomical fitting studies using a three-dimensiona l computer model of the chest cavity. Second-generation prototypes are currently being developed, and they are scheduled for medium-term ben ch and in vivo testing by early 1994.