Cannula position and Bernoulli effect contribute to leg malperfusion during extracorporeal life support with femoral arterial cannulation-an in silico simulation study†.

Objectives: Limb ischaemia during extracorporeal life support (ECLS) using femoral artery cannulation is frequently observed even in patients with regular vessel diameters and without peripheral arterial occlusive disease. We investigated underlying pathomechanisms using a virtual fluid-mechanical simulation of the human circulation.

Methods: A life-sized model of the human aorta and major vascular branches was virtualized using 3-dimensional segmentation software (Mimics, Materialise).

Simulation of personalised haemodynamics by various mounting positions of a prosthetic valve using computational fluid dynamics.

Diseases of the cardiovascular system account for nearly 42% of all deaths in the European Union. In Germany, approximately 12,000 patients receive surgical replacement of the aortic valve due to heart valve disease alone each year. A three-dimensional (3D) numerical model based on patient-specific anatomy derived from four-dimensional (4D) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data was developed to investigate preoperatively the flow-induced impact of mounting positions of aortic prosthetic valves to select the best orientation for individual patients.