In pediatric cardiology, every heartbeat counts, especially for the one in 4,000 newborns born with an underdeveloped lower chamber, or ventricle, of the heart.
Ellis Meng, the Shelly and Ofer Nemirovsky Chair in Convergent Bioscience and professor of biomedical engineering and electrical and computer engineering, and her team are leading innovative research aimed at enhancing survival rates for babies with congenital heart defects who rely on systemic-to-pulmonary artery shunts. They are developing a non-invasive sensing system to monitor blood flow in these critical shunts, detecting blockages and irregularities early enough for timely, potentially life-saving interventions.
For these newborns, the Blalock-Taussig shunt is essential. Surgically implanted, it maintains adequate blood flow but can unexpectedly become blocked, which can lead to hypoxia and sudden complications. The rapid growth of infants and the shunt’s small size make it challenging to balance blood flow, frustrating pediatric cardiologists and cardiac surgeons trying to ensure stable, effective circulation.
Meng’s team hopes to pioneer a system that continuously monitors shunt function, offering real-time, non-invasive insights into blood flow dynamics. This capability would enable clinicians to detect early signs of obstruction or insufficient flow, allowing for timely interventions that could prevent life-threatening complications. By integrating advanced sensing and computational modeling, she said, the team aims to transform shunt management and, in the long term, advance data-driven innovations in shunt monitoring and design.
Designing such a sophisticated sensor system presents unique challenges due to the extremely small size of newborns. Infants have much tinier vascular structures than adults, which makes the task of monitoring blood flow even more daunting. “These shunts are about three millimeters in diameter,” Meng said, “but even then, we’re operating from the outside of the shunt.” This non-contact approach preserves patient safety while providing clinicians with valuable real-time data on blood flow.
This project started with a chance introduction to Dr. Vishal Nigam, a pediatric cardiologist at Seattle Children’s Hospital, who had experienced the difficulty of maintaining stable shunt function in infants. They secured initial funding from the National Institutes of Health and brought on Juan Carlos del Alamo from the University of Washington to help with developing a model of blood flow in shunted patients.
With additional backing from Additional Ventures’ flagship 2024 Single Ventricle Research Fund (SVRF), a program dedicated to bold solutions for single ventricle heart defects, Meng’s team was one of 14 research groups awarded money. The three-year, $600,000 grant allows them to move their innovative shunt-monitoring concept from lab-based testing into preclinical models.
Photo credit: USC Viterbi