Use of computational fluid dynamics to analyze blood flow, hemolysis and sublethal damage to red blood cells in a bileaflet artificial heart valve

Abstract

Artificial heart valves may expose blood to flow conditions that lead to unnaturally high stress and damage to blood cells as well as issues with thrombosis. The purpose of this research was to predict the trauma caused to red blood cells (RBCs), including hemolysis, from the stresses applied to them and their exposure time as determined by analysis of simulation results for blood flow through both a functioning and malfunctioning bileaflet artificial heart valve. The calculations provided the spatial distribution of the Kolmogorov length scales that were used to estimate the spatial and size distributions of the smallest turbulent flow eddies in the flow field. The number and surface area of these eddies in the blood were utilized to predict the amount of hemolysis experienced by RBCs. Results indicated that hemolysis levels are low while suggesting stresses at the leading edge of the leaflet may contribute to subhemolytic damage characterized by shortened circulatory lifetimes and reduced RBC deformability.