This has been on my reading list for months, and I just had a chance to read it. It’s a really compelling description of a new generation of artificial hearts.
No Pulse: How Doctors Reinvented The Human Heart
Building a heart that mimics nature’s lub-dub may be as comically shortsighted as Leonardo da Vinci designing a flying machine with flapping wings. Nature is not always the best designer, at least when it comes to things that humans must build and maintain. So the newest artificial heart doesn’t imitate the cardiac muscle at all. Instead, it whirs like a little propeller, pushing blood through the body at a steady rate. After 500 million years of evolution accustoming the human body to blood moving through us in spurts, a pulse may not be necessary. That, in any case, is the point of view of the 50-odd calves, and no fewer than three human beings, who have gotten along just fine with their blood coursing through them as evenly as Freon through an air conditioner.
Source: popsci.com
I’m not sure adding touchscreens to everything qualifies as “good design,” but I’m glad that medical device companies are finally considering form in addition to function.
A Gold Rush In Medical Design, Inspired Partly By iPads
There’s a “gold rush” in the medical field to create a new device to treat chronic hypertension in minutes. How do you stand out? Look to touch screens.
Source: fastcodesign.com

