3D printing has been a topic of interest for a
considerable amount of time now. We have seen 3D printed cars on a few roads
and even seen 3D sandwiches.
However, it was not until mid September that the
biggest breakthrough in 3D printing technology was reported. A 3D printed heart
had not just been developed but it had actually been used to save the life of a
sixteen year old heart tumor patient!
Bradley White, 16 and a resident of Plymouth
Michigan was suffering from irregular heartbeat. He had been receiving medical
care from Cincinnati Children’s Hospital where the doctors discovered that the
condition was being caused by a tumor in Bradley’s heart. According to care
givers at the hospital, Bradley was actually born with a tumor in his
heart.
Throughout his childhood life, he had undergone
several open-heart surgeries and a defibrillator had actually been implanted to
protect the young boy from sudden cardiac death. Most recently he found himself
back at the hospital for yet another procedure, this time to stop electrical
interference that was being caused by the tumor.
3D printed heart delivers insightful results
Seeing the need and urgency to understand the
situation, Bradley’s doctor, Dr. Michael Taylor who is also the director of
Advanced Imaging at The Heart Institute in consultation with his team
contracted Materialise to print a 3D replica of Bradley’s heart.
Known for their wealth of skill and experience in
3D printing, Materialise (MTLS) quickly got to work uploading Bradley’s CT scan
data into a Mimics Innovation Software and carefully customizing the data
according to the parts to be printed. Once that was done, Materialize cardiovascular specialist Todd Pietila created the 3D printed “copy” of the
boy’s heart and handed it to cardiac surgeon Dr. David Morales and cardiologist
Dr. Timothy Klansman. It was printed in hard but opaque material with
surrounding anatomical strictures delivered in flexible transparent material.
The uniquely printed heart allowed doctors as well
as Bradley and his family to better understand his heart condition. With it
doctors were able to confidently proceed with catheter ablation and an electrocardiography study instead of a risky and expensive surgical resection procedure.
Bradley was so impressed and outright relieved with
the 3D print. He was quoted saying, “I had always thought the tumor was the
size of a quarter. I didn’t realize how bit it was until I saw the 3D print from Materialize.”
for more : Careers in 3d printing
To know more about "Careers in 3d printing" Find on Google
No comments:
Post a Comment