UCalgary Researchers Develop Test for Medical Device Compatibility

Medical devices and implants such as catheters, heart valves, and stents are important tools for diagnosing and treating cardiovascular conditions. However, they are often linked with blood clots because the clots can form when the device is in contact with body fluids like blood and plasma.

These blood clots can be serious, causing an array of symptoms and increasing patients’ risk of heart attacks, strokes, organ damage, and even death.

Maryam Badv, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Schulich School of Engineering and a member of the University of Calgary Cumming School of Medicine’s Libin Cardiovascular Institute, notes that medical device-related clotting is a “billion-dollar kind of a problem” for the healthcare sector.

Despite the importance of accurate testing, past techniques used to assess and monitor materials have been limited and cannot accurately depict the ways in which a device will interact with body fluids, Badv said.

“When devices are used in the clinic, they come into contact with blood and other biological fluids and, historically, there hasn’t been an accurate test for that,” she explained.

To try to solve the problem, Badv and members in the Translational Biomedical Engineering Lab have teamed up with Dr. Zahra Abbasi, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Software Engineering at Schulich, who heads the Calgary Sensor Lab that focuses on applying radio frequency and microwave circuits and systems for real-time sensing and detection.

The collaboration aims to develop a bio-sensor with more realistic and sensitive ways to detect, measure, and assess clot formation on biomaterials using electromagnetic radiation.

To support their project, Badv and Abassi received a 2023 New Frontiers in Research Fund grant, which requires unique, cross-discipline collaborations between researchers who don’t typically work together.

They are excited about the collaboration and the potential of the bio-sensor, which will be able to detect clot formation regardless of the sample size and type and the fluid used to test.

“This unique approach relies on the interaction between the sensor’s engineered electromagnetic waves and the surface we are testing,” Abbasi stated. “We see this monitoring device as a necessary step in biomaterial development and testing, which also contributes to the future policy development around the safety assessment of the medical implants.”

Badv says the sensor will become an important tool in her lab, and she hopes others will be able to take advantage of it.

“Moving forward, if my lab develops a surface coating or polymer, we will have a tool that will be able to assess its biocompatibility,” she remarked. “The goal is to be able to more precisely say that this polymer or surface coating is suitable for use in the body so we can improve outcomes for patients.”

The Libin Cardiovascular Institute co-ordinates cardiovascular science research, education and patient care as an entity of both Alberta Health Services and the University of Calgary.