Rotary blood pump diagnostics and cardiac output controller

A method for controlling a ventricular assist device, the method comprising:

• providing a ventricular assist device definable in terms of operational parameters;
• providing an estimation method for correlating physiological parameters measured from a patient to at least one operational parameter;
• measuring at least one physiological parameter reflecting a physiological state corresponding to a patient;
• measuring at least one operational parameter reflecting a state of the ventricular assist device;
• correlating physiological parameters measured from a patient to the operational parameters using an estimation method;
• selecting a physiological state definable by desired values of the physiological parameters;
• and
• controlling input values of the operational parameter to establish the desired values of the physiological parameters.

A method for controlling a ventricular assist device, the method comprising:

• providing a ventricular assist device definable in terms of operational parameters;
• providing an estimation method for correlating physiological parameters measured from a patient to at least one operational parameter;
• measuring at least one physiological parameter reflecting a physiological state corresponding to a patient;
• measuring at least one operational parameter reflecting a state of the ventricular assist device;
• correlating physiological parameters measured from a patient to the operational parameters using an estimation comprising statistical curve fitting techniques;
• selecting a physiological state definable by desired values of the physiological parameters;
• monitoring at least one operational parameter to provide an output;
• and
• controlling input values of the operational parameter to establish the desired values of the physiological parameters using the output provided by the monitoring step.

An apparatus for assisting a defective heart of a patient, the apparatus comprising:

• a pump;
• a motive drive operably connected to drive the pump;
• the motive drive, further comprising an impeller for motivating blood flow from and to a native heart of a patient;
• a sensor operably connected to the motive drive to detect the value of an operational parameter of the motive drive;
• and
• a processor operably connected to the motive drive and the sensor to retrieve information from the sensor, and determine a value of the operational parameter, and to provide control to the motive drive in order to affect a physiological parameter corresponding to a patient's heart, the processor programmed to use a statistical correlation between the physiological parameter and the operational parameter of the motive drive.