Development and characterization of unique polymer dielectric coating for medical devices

心律失常或不规则心跳是患者心脏无法正常工作的情况;心脏可以跳动得太快，太慢或任何其他不规则模式。大多数时候，心律失常发生时没有任何症状，但在严重的情况下，可能会导致心悸，胸痛，昏厥，甚至心力衰竭。虽然这种情况在老年人中更常见，但它可以发生在任何年龄。近年来，约有2%至3%的北美人口受到心律失常的影响，常见的治疗方法包括药物治疗，起搏器植入和心脏手术。心脏消融是去除/破坏这些有缺陷的心脏组织从而恢复心脏功能的许多方法之一。 有规律的跳动节奏。在大多数情况下，缺损组织位于心脏的左心房或左心室中。为了进入这些区域，从患者腹股沟区域通过静脉将长而灵活的器械（也称为房间隔穿刺针）插入心脏。一旦进入心脏，一个特殊的程序，经中隔穿刺，在心脏膜上创建一个小孔，进行。该小孔允许器械进一步进入左心房，以在去除有缺陷的组织之前到达所需位置。 Baylis Medical Company是开发和制造体内手术工具的领先制造商之一，例如为全球医院治疗心律失常的房间隔穿刺针。这些手术器械中的关键组件之一是用于保护人体组织和工具的特殊生物相容性外层涂层。 贝利斯医疗公司正在寻求与多伦多大学合作，开发新材料和涂层制造工艺，以应用于下一代手术工具。通过结合多伦多大学在聚合物科学和制造技术方面的学术专长和Baylis Medical Company的生物医学专长，新材料研究和工艺创新被设想用于新涂层材料，这将使安大略医疗保健行业在制造和产品开发方面更具竞争力。

Cardiac arrhythmia, or irregular heartbeat, is a condition of which the patients heart cannot function properly; the heart can be either beating too fast, too slow, or in any other irregular patterns. Most of the time, arrhythmia occurs without any symptoms, but in serious conditions, may lead to heart palpitation, chest pains, fainting, or even heart failure. Although this condition is more common in elderly populations, it can happen at any age. In recent years, around 2 to 3% of the North American populations are affected by cardiac arrhythmia and common treatments include medication, pacemaker implant, and heart surgery. Cardiac ablation is one of the many methods of which removes/destroys these faulty heart tissues thereby restoring regular beating rhythm. In most cases, the defected tissues are located in the left atrium or left ventricle of the heart. To gain access to these regions, a long and flexible instrument, also known as transseptal needle, is inserted from patients groin area and into the heart though the vein. Once inside the heart, a special procedure, transseptal puncture which creates a small hole on the heart membrane, is performed. The small hole allows the instrument to further enter the left atrium to reach the desire location before removing the faulty tissues. Baylis Medical Company is one of the leading manufacturers that develop and fabricate in vivo surgical tools such as transseptal needles for hospitals globally to treat cardiac arrhythmia. One of the critical components in these surgical instruments is a special biocompatible outer layer coating for protecting both the human tissue and the tool. Baylis Medical Company is seeking to collaborate with the University of Toronto in developing new materials and manufacturing processes of the coating layer to be applied to the next generation surgical tools. Through the combination of the academic expertise in polymer science and manufacturing technologies available at the University of Toronto and the biomedical expertise at Baylis Medical Company, novel material research and process innovations are envisioned for the new coating material that will make Ontario healthcare sectors more competitive in manufacturing and product development.