Method of making a blood pumping membrance for artificial ventricles

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION FIG.
1 shows an artificial ventricle 10 which may be used as a ventricle assist device or as part of the total artificial heart.
The ventricle includes a ventricular housing 11, which represents the blood chamber portion of the ventricle (the pumping portion of the ventricle being represented by a base section 12 which is shown in phantom line).
Inlet 13 and outlet 14 ports are positioned in a conventional manner within the ventricular housing 11 to provide unidirectional flow for blood into the blood pumping chamber 15.
The pumping chamber 16 is enclosed within the base section or pumping housing 12 in a conventional manner and includes a drive line 17 which can be attached to a pneumatic source for pumping fluid.
The attachment and operation of the pumping housing 12 is in accordance with conventional techniques and is not further developed in this description.
The pumping chamber 16 supplies the pumping fluid to sequentially displace a pumping diaphragm 20 between an extended position as illustrated in FIG.
1 (representing the ventricle at systole configuration) and a retracted position (not shown) wherein the pumping diaphragm 20 is pulled downward and extends toward the base of the pumping chamber as shown by phantom line 19 (representing the configuration of the ventricle in diastole).
The illustrated ventricle 10 includes a blood contacting membrane 21 which is formed as part of the pumping membrane 20.
As will be shown hereafter, this membrane may be formed by a single process of injection molding, wherein the pumping membrane 20 is formed as a single structure with a blood contacting surface 21 which forms a portion of the blood chamber 15.
This blood contacting membrane 21 may also be formed by other molding techniques, such as dip molding, solution casting, vacuum forming, pressure forming and similar techniques in which the desired dome structure may be mass produced.
A significant aspect of this blood contacting membrane arises in that the natural configuration of this membrane is substantially corresponding to the configuration of the membrane when in systole, in the absence of any pumping force