A FINITE-ELEMENT STUDY OF THE BLOOD-FLOW IN TOTAL CAVOPULMONARY CONNECTION

The present study is a preliminary investigation into the total cavopu lmonary connection (TCPC) blood flow structure in Fontan procedures. O ur aim is to gain a better understanding of flow reversal in vascular circulation. In this paper we consider a two-dimensional mathematical model of the Navier-Stokes equations. Specifically, we study the lamin ar flow in the blood vessel with outlets at which a free boundary cond ition is specified. To further simplify the analysis, the vessel walls are regarded as being rigid. In quadratic elements, we employ the str eamline upwind Petrov-Galerkin finite element model as our strategy to simulate incompressible fluid flows. The adopted finite element model is featured by the presence of artificial damping terms added solely in the streamline direction. With these terms added to the formulation , the discrete system is enhanced while solution accuracy is maintaine d without deterioration due to false diffusion errors. In this finite element flow study, our emphasis is placed on the role of the offsets as a control parameter in order to optimize the blood flow after the s urgical intervene. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.