With less than 24 hours to go before he faced heart surgery to relocate heart vessels which were constricting and compressing his wind pipe and esophagus, tiny not-quite-two-year-old Liam Summers waited as Washington University cardiologist Dr. Peter Manning and his surgical team examined a precise 3D replica of Liam’s heart.
Liam’s father, Mike Summer, said seeing the 3D printed model of his son’s heart helped him understand the procedure his boy was facing at the St. Louis Children’s Hospital in Missouri.
It’s all in a day’s work for cardiologists like Dr. Manning as 3D printed models are becoming commonplace tools in the process of medical care. They make it simpler for patients and families to grasp the details of complex medical procedures, and they provide medical practitioners with invaluable opportunities to practice and prepare for their work in the operating room.
The 3D printing technology in play in Liam’s case resulted from combining MRI images and a 3D printer to create a life-sized replica of the boy’s heart and the network of vessels that were the cause of the problems he had breathing and swallowing.
Dr. Shafkat Anwar, a member of the cardiology team who handled Liam’s case, worked with 3D Systems to develop the model heart.
“It is something else for us to be able to put out the exact replica of the patient’s anatomy and hand that to someone who’s going to be doing the operation, and say ‘this is what you’re going to be facing in the operating room,'” Dr. Anwar told KSDK.
As he held a model of Liam’s heart, Dr. Manning explained how the model impacted the surgical team and the resulting procedure.
“This helps us recognize why the child might have breathing problems,” Manning said. “There’s an area that looks like narrowing of the trachea. We know the esophagus goes right through there, so every time that he swallows things are likely to get hung up there as well,” said Dr. Manning.
That Thursday morning marked the occasion of 20-month-old Liam’s fifth surgery. Only a scant few minutes after the two-and-a-half hour surgery was complete, Dr. Manning said the 3D printed of model of Liam’s heart proved critical to the success of the operation.
“The 3D model and the imaging we could create with the MRI gave us a very accurate picture that let us get the dissection done more quickly and less trauma to tissue in there,” Manning said. “He went to sleep fine and everything went real smoothly. We got in there and the anatomy was just like we expected. Swallowing stuff, I would guess, should be noticeably better within the next couple of weeks.”
Liam’s surgery was yet another example of how doctor’s are using 3D printed models to inform themselves and their teams of what to expect during delicate surgeries.
What do you think of how doctors use 3D printing to help patients with a wide range of medical issues? Let us know in the 3D Printed Model of Two-Year-Old’s Heart forum thread on 3DPB.com.
Subscribe to Our Email Newsletter
Stay up-to-date on all the latest news from the 3D printing industry and receive information and offers from third party vendors.
You May Also Like
Lockheed Martin Adds 16,000 Square Feet of 3D Printing to Texas Facility
Defense giant Lockheed Martin has unveiled a substantial increase in its additive manufacturing (AM) capabilities with an expansion of its facility in Grand Prairie, Texas. The addition includes some 16,000...
EOS Launches New P3 NEXT SLS 3D Printer at Formnext 2004
EOS, the German-US leader in additive manufacturing (AM) solutions, has launched the P3 NEXT selective laser sintering (SLS) printer at Formnext 2024 in Frankfurt, Germany (November 19-22). EOS created the...
3D Printing Webinar and Event Roundup: November 10, 2024
We’ve got another busy week ahead of webinars and events around the world! There are multiple open houses and conferences, advanced AM training, a 3D printer launch event, our own...
Dinsmore Gains Ability to 3D Print Functional Stents Thanks to Axtra3D
As essentially everyone familiar with additive manufacturing (AM) knows, one of the greatest advantages of 3D printing technologies is the potential to produce parts with complex geometries that are unachievable...