Scientists have been working to test out a new and “revolutionary” pacemaker that is now expected to be trialed in New Zealand this year.
The team of researchers was led by Julian Paton from the University of Auckland developed a “bionic” pacemaker called Cysoni. This is a device that responds to the body’s signals in real-time. This device would monitor respiration and alter heart rate accordingly. It will not tick at a constant rhythm.
“If you analyze the frequencies within your heart rate, you find the heart rate is coupled to your breathing,” Paton explained in a press release. “It goes up on inspiration, and it goes down on expiration, and that is a natural phenomenon in all animals and humans. And we’re talking about very ancient animals that were on the planet 430 million years ago.”
They also investigated the possibility of making a new type of pacemaker twenty years ago to treat patients with heart failure. This is a condition in which the heart cannot pump enough blood to meet the body’s needs, and it leads to a loss of natural heart rate variability, which is beyond the capabilities of today’s pacemakers. Since the heartbeat of people with this condition is not modulated by their breathing, the scientists decided to see if putting the heart rate variability back into animals with heart failure would do any good.
It is expected to restore heart rate variability by monitoring the lungs and detecting the electrical signals generated by the body as it breathes. According to the study, it then utilizes precisely timed impulses to speed up and slow down the heart as needed, published in Basic Research in Cardiology.
The device produced positive results in rats.
“Currently, pacemakers trigger a metronomically steady beat, but this study shows introducing a natural variation in the heartbeat improves the heart’s ability to pump blood through the body,” Rohit Ramchandra, study author, said. “The other big news is that we get a 20 percent improvement in cardiac output, which is effectively the ability of the heart to pump blood through the body. And 20 percent is a big number.”
This pacemaker “has far exceeded our expectations,” said Dr. Martin Stiles, a cardiologist who will lead the trial. “This discovery may revolutionize how heart failure patients are paced in the future.”
The next step will be human testing later this year in New Zealand.