HapticHeart

HapticHeart Solutions

Our goal is to revolutionize the $14 billion per year cardiac catheterization market by integrating haptic feedback into catheter procedures to improve safety, procedural efficiency, and patient outcomes.

We are building a system that takes signals from various systems within the cardiac cath/electrophysiology lab and translates them into haptic feedback that is delivered to operators in near real-time via a wearable. This device-agnostic solution can be customized for multiple use cases in catheter-based interventional cardiology, cardiac electrophysiology, and structural heart procedures. Our current design includes a microprocessor that communicates with wearable and catheter handle concepts.

Company Focus

Interventional cardiologists have lost their sense of touch which is needed to help them better navigate the rapid pace of innovation, and current solutions are creating visual overload and more complexity

Cardiac procedures are transitioning from open-chest to catheter-based with increasing degrees of complexity. These procedures require challenging and potentially risky maneuvers such as accessing the left side of the heart from the right using a needle (transseptal puncture), repairing and replacing heart valves, implanting left atrial appendage occlusion devices and ablation of cardiac tissue by manipulating the handle of a catheter that doesn’t provide tactile feedback. The rapid pace of innovation requires even the most experienced operators to repeatedly learn new techniques and technologies. • Inexperience leads to complications. • Less experienced operators are needed to meet procedural demand.

Our Technology

A system and a wearable device that converts physiological signals into actionable haptic feedback

HapticHeart Solutions™ enables physicians to palpate dynamic changes in biophysical properties of the heart and surrounding structures while performing catheter-based cardiovascular procedures.

FAQ

What types of signals does the haptic system work with?

The HapticHeart computing system can input and tranduce any physiologic or biophysical signal into palpable sensations that simulate the data input including measurements of intra-cardiac pressure, catheter-tissue contact force, electrical indices including electrogram wave forms and impedance, blood flow data, temperature. It is not a vibratory alert system but rather designed to recreate and simulate what is being sensed enabling the operator to feel as if their hand and fingers are inside the heart.

Has there been any proof-of-concept data to date?

Yes. Data including work performed using animal studies has been published in peer reviewed journals and presented at international conferences including American College of Cardiology, Atrial Fibrillation Symposium, Cardiovascular Research Technologies, and IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Abstracts of this work can be provided upon request.