This week we stumbled across a guy by the name of M. Joshua Morris, who has devoted two and a half years of blog posts, tweets and Facebook updates to a medical device called a left ventricular assist device. His is made by medical device company Thoratec, but there are several other models being developed or tested, or already cleared for use in other countries. They’re used to partially replace the pumping function of the left ventricle of a failing heart, either temporarily or permanently, in patients who can’t find a donor heart or may not survive a transplant. A device is implanted just below the diaphragm and includes an external, wearable system with batteries and a small controller.
