For as long as scientists, physicians, and engineers have been studying the heart, they have been trying to improve performance through every means possible—from pharmaceuticals to complicated permanent implantable device systems, and even bioengineered tissues.
The heart poses a unique challenge in that its operation always prioritizes the health of other organs in the body. Beyond the damage the may occur due to disease or age progression, the heart will literally weaken and damage itself in the mission of perfusing critical end organs like the brain and liver, and in many cases this damage is irreversible. Once weakened the heart will limit patient activity level, quality of life, and ultimately overall survival.
Treatments for heart disease range from simple pills to complex devices or even heart transplant. The advances in these approaches have been remarkable in both the strength of the therapy but also the reduction in complications. Today, a pacemaker can be implanted which replicates normal patient physiology and which will work for more than a decade—decades ago a pacemaker meant at most 18 months of basic heart rate support. At the same time, the new pacemaker can be implanted faster than the old one, with a smaller, simpler surgical cut. While the therapeutic advance itself is remarkable, and the risk/benefit of the procedure is much better, the new pacemakers take advantage of major technology advances that let them function as de facto monitors, capturing vast amounts of information about the patient. And beyond all this work around repair and restoration, there are other efforts related to improving transplant or enabling xenotransplantation for cross species availability of organs.
This issue of Pulse touches on several different avenues of cardiovascular technology advances—from mechanical to biological to artificial intelligence (AI). While tremendous progress has been made, much work is ahead of us.
In this issue, we also put some focus on early career academic-phase BME activities, design projects, and career mentoring. For anyone who is planning a long career working in the BME field, this strong foundation is critical to getting a good start.
Lastly, in this issue we include a tribute to Colin Brenan. Colin was a lifelong innovator who focused on drug discovery and who was active in IEEE, including a stint as editor of Pulse. He was a collaborator and mentor and will be missed by those who knew and worked with him.
Mike Hess,
Editor-in-Chief