Catheter having improved proximal shaft design

Abstract

A catheter and subassemblies for catheters having improved proximal regions, and mid-regions including hypotube having distally increasing flexibility. One catheter has a kink resistant proximal shaft not including hypotube and including an outer tube disposed over a braid disposed over an inner tube. One catheter includes a proximal shaft having a 12-inch long strain relief disposed about a tubular region formed of hypotube. Another catheter includes a proximal hypotube shaft having a set curve imparted through bending and annealing, resulting in a catheter hypotube shaft having reduced spring and decreased kink radius. A catheter subassembly includes a hypotube shaft having a helical cut into the hypotube wall to increase flexibility over the length of the cut. One helical cut extends through the hypotube wall and includes a polymeric sleeve thereover to allow the cut hypotube to function as an inflation fluid delivery tube.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.