Cardiac Loading using Passive Left Atrial Pressurization and Passive Afterload for Graft Assessment

The scope of this research covers two important areas of cardiac ex vivo machine perfusion. First, it highlights the shortcomings of current clinically-used assessment metrics in determining graft viability and transplantability. Second, it provides an alternative assessment technique capable of discerning between viable and unviable grafts, even when conventional metrics fail to do so.

Through this work, we developed a gravity-dependent loading reservoir that significantly simplifies and standardize the incorporation of loading capabilities into existing ex vivo machine perfusion systems. This, in combination with passive afterload, seems to significantly increase the predictive capabilities of the technique. The field has been in dire need of quantitative assessment metrics that eliminate the subjectivity of current practices.

This work offers a method to obtain quantitative objective metrics for assessing graft variability. This assessment method is expected to significantly improve the ability to draw conclusions from both experimental and clinical setups.