Device and method for cardiac arrhythmia therapy with failure detection and backup
First Claim
1. A cardioverter/defibrillator device structured to be implanted in a patient'"'"'s body for automatic response to sensing of electrical cardiac activity of the patient'"'"'s heart to detect and treat disorders thereof, comprising:
- primary control mode means responsive to detection of fibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart for causing the generation of a prescribed electrical waveform regimen as electrical defibrillation therapy for application to the heart, andsecondary control mode means responsive to a predetermined type of failure mechanism of the device that causes malfunction of the primary control mode means for thereupon assuming control of generation of the electrical defibrillation therapy from the primary control mode means, and further responsive to detection of fibrillation after assuming said control to cause the generation of the electrical fibrillation therapy as a backup system for defibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart.
3 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
An implantable automatic cardioverter/defibrillator device for a cardiac patient has a primary control mode for a defibrillation therapy delivery system. The primary control mode is responsive to detection of fibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart for causing the delivery of a preselected electrical waveform therapy to the heart. The device also has a secondary control mode which is enabled by detecting a predetermined failure mechanism that causes malfunctioning of the primary mode. The enabled secondary control mode uses at least some of the functional part of the primary mode in responding to fibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart to initiate generation of defibrillation therapy for application to the patient'"'"'s heart.
35 Citations
12 Claims
-
1. A cardioverter/defibrillator device structured to be implanted in a patient'"'"'s body for automatic response to sensing of electrical cardiac activity of the patient'"'"'s heart to detect and treat disorders thereof, comprising:
-
primary control mode means responsive to detection of fibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart for causing the generation of a prescribed electrical waveform regimen as electrical defibrillation therapy for application to the heart, and secondary control mode means responsive to a predetermined type of failure mechanism of the device that causes malfunction of the primary control mode means for thereupon assuming control of generation of the electrical defibrillation therapy from the primary control mode means, and further responsive to detection of fibrillation after assuming said control to cause the generation of the electrical fibrillation therapy as a backup system for defibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
-
-
8. A method of delivering electrical defibrillation therapy to a patient'"'"'s heart from an implanted cardiac therapy device after malfunction of the device, comprising the device-implemented steps of:
-
detecting a predetermined failure mechanism causing malfunction in a primary control mode subsystem of a therapy delivery system of the device, automatically enabling a secondary control mode subsystem of the therapy delivery system as a backup control mode upon detecting said failure mechanism, sensing the patient'"'"'s cardiac activity to detect fibrillation, and causing generation of a preselected therapy regimen by the enabled secondary control mode subsystem upon confirming sustained fibrillation. - View Dependent Claims (9)
-
-
10. A defibrillator adapted to be implanted in a patient to monitor cardiac activity and to respond to fibrillation of the patient'"'"'s heart by generating defibrillation therapy, comprising:
-
means for generating defibrillation therapy, a primary system to initiate said generation of defibrillation therapy for application to the heart, a fault detector for sensing a defect of said primary system that prevents initiating said generation of defibrillation therapy by the primary system; and a standby system responsive to sensing of a defect by said fault detector for replacing the defective primary system, and responsive to heart rate indicative of fibrillation for initiating said generation of defibrillation therapy to be applied to the heart. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12)
-
Specification