Angiographic guidewire with safety core wire
AssigneeMedrad, Inc.
InventorsMarlin S. Heilman, Seid W. Waddell
Life of this patent
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Abstract
There is disclosed a catheter guidewire and a method for manufacturing the guidewire. In one embodiment, the guidewire is developed from a coiled semi-rectangular flatwire which has been coated with a surface lubricant such as Teflon prior to winding. In another embodiment, the flatwire is wound, polished by abrasion and then electropolished. A combination safety core wire extends longitudinally within the coiled guidewire and is welded to the respective ends of the guidewire. The safety core wire is a cylindrical wire whose uniform main body is smoothly tapered into an ultra-flexible flattened distal tip by means of combined mechanical metal forming and electro-etching techniques.
Claims10
A guidewire adapted to guide a catheter into the body of a patient, the guidewire comprising:
- an elongated outer casing defined by an elongated rectangular flatwire having a width dimension and a height dimension less than said width dimension and having been wound into a coil spring wherein the surface of said outer casing is defined by consecutive coils of contacting widths;
- and a coating of coating material completely encasing the the flatwire which defines the coils of the coil spring;
- wherein said flatwire is coated prior to being wound.
A guidewire adapted to guide a catheter into the body of a patient, the guidewire comprising:
- an elongated rectangular flatwire having a width dimension and a height dimension less than said width dimension and having been wound into a coil spring;
- wherein the surface of said outer casing is defined by consecutive coils of contacting widths;
- wherein the surface of said coil spring is mechanically ground to remove gross irregularities therefrom;
- and wherein the surface of said coil spring is subsequently electropolished to remove microscopic irregularities therefrom.
A guidewire adapted to guide an angiographic catheter into the body of a patient, the guidewire comprising:
- an elongated, flexible outer casing;
- and a combined core and safety wire extending longitudinally within said outer casing and attached thereto at the respective ends thereof;
- said core and safety wire having a flexible main body and an ultra-flexible tip, wherein the ultra-flexible tip is defined by a region of smoothly tapering cross-sectional area extending from a location on said main body toward one end thereof and a generally linear region of uniform cross-sectional area between said region of tapering cross-sectional area and said one end, said region of generally uniform cross-sectional area having a generally ellipitcal cross section with a major dimension being larger than a transverse minor dimension.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.