TACAIRE · Tools for Ablation of Cardiac Arrhythmias by IRreversible Electroporation

Tools for Ablation of Cardiac Arrhythmias by IRreversible Electroporation

Cardiac arrhythmias, a group of conditions in which the heartbeat is abnormal, are among the most recurrent cardiovascular diseases with an important impact in the quality of life of patients (atrial fibrillation is predicted to affect 17.9 million patients in Europe by 2060). When drug therapy fails in the correct management of these diseases, ablation, the selective damage of small regions of the cardiac tissue, is used instead. Current ablation techniques use thermal energy to destroy the target areas with success rates up to 70 %. However, there are complications, such as severe oesophageal or phrenic nerve injury or vascular stenosis, that current thermal treatments cannot overcome. The TACAIRE proposal is focused on the development of new technological tools and methods for the non-thermal ablation of cardiac arrhythmias. In particular, the explored technique is Irreversible Electroporation (IRE), commonly known as Pulsed Field Ablation (PFA) which consists in the application of short and high intensity electric field pulses to kill the cells of the target tissue region. The goal of TACAIRE is to study the mechanisms of the technique and propose technological improvements to overcome some identified limitations of PFA that could prevent this technique from being definitively established in the routine clinical practice for cardiac ablation. In particular, some of these limitations are related to the induction of strong muscle contractions during PFA application with monopolar catheters. Another challenge deals with increasing lesion depth for ablation of ventricular tissue in a safe manner. The project involved a host team of biomedical/electronic engineers and a secondment partner of cardiologists. This structure was perfectly aligned with the multidisciplinary nature of the proposal and provided all the necessary resources to correctly develop the action and the career prospects of the fellow. This project demonstrated the effects of different energy application parameters, specifically the frequency of the waveform applied on the induction of muscle contractions and efficacy of the treatment. It also developed a numerical modelling framework to compare the classical ablation technology (radiofrequency) with the new technology studied. During the project a proof of concept of a novel catheter and therapeutic strategy was validated what could open the door for future medical devices and therapies.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз