Georgia Institute of Technology College of Sciences

Pulmonary embolism (PE) is a potentially-fatal disease in which blood clots (i.e., emboli) break free from the deep veins in the body and migrate to the lungs. In order to prevent PE, anticoagulants are often prescribed; however, for some patients, anticoagulants cannot be used. For such patients, a mechanical filter, namely an inferior vena cava (IVC) filter, is inserted into the IVC to trap the blood clots and prevent them from reaching the lungs. There are numerous IVC filter designs, and it is not well understood which particular IVC filter geometry will result in the best treatment for a given patient. Patient-specific computational fluid dynamic (CFD) simulations may be used to predict the performance of IVC filters and hence can aid physicians in IVC filter selection and placement. In this talk, I will first describe our computational pipeline for prediction of IVC filter performance. Our pipeline involves several steps including image processing, geometric model construction, in vivo stress state estimation, surface and volume mesh generation based on virtual IVC filter placement, and CFD simulation of IVC hemodynamics. I will then present the results of our IVC hemodynamics simulations obtained for two patient IVCs. This talk represents joint work with several researchers at The Pennsylvania State University, Penn State Hershey Medical Center, the Penn State Applied Research Lab, and the University of Utah.