Zurich Heart
In industrial nations, approximately 1-2% of the population suffers from severe heart failure summing up to 10 Million people in Europe.
Heart transplantation is the only curative treatment of end stage heart failure. However, the number of patients on the waiting lists for organ transplantation is increasingly disproportionate to the number of heart transplants. An alternative treatment option of patients with end stage heart failure is the use of mechanical circulatory assist devices (VAD) in order to support the function of the failing heart.
However, there is a number of unresolved problems associated with the use of ventricular assist devices.
In one part, Zurich Heart investigates and develops new technologies that are required to improve the performance of existing ventricular assist devices (VADs), such as energy supply and information transfer, blood-implant surface interactions (to prevent thrombosis and haemolysis) as well as dynamic and adaptive control mechanism.
On the other hand, we are aiming at disruptive innovations and technologies to facilitate radically new artificial heart designs and assist device technologies, such as soft pumps and hybrid membranes.