WIRELESS POWERED FLEXIBLE GASTROSTIMULATOR

Abstract

Gastric electrical stimulation (GES) is an effective alternative to long-term dietary and medicinal treatment for gastroparesis. This work presents the design and development of two miniature implantable battery-less gastrostimulators, operated by wireless radio-frequency power. The devices deliver controlled electrical pulses to the stomach tissues to help regain normal motility. The first prototype was designed with the goal to optimize the wireless power transfer efficiency, various antenna configurations were investigated. The attenuation due to human tissue barrier was examined with an equivalent model. To enable reconfiguring the device to meet the patients' needs after implantation, a novel method of changing the settings without an additionally dedicated wireless communication channel has been proposed and demonstrated in this work. The second prototype was a flexible gastrostimulator. The device was designed with energy harvesting antenna on one side and stimulation electrodes with the circuit on the other side. The wireless power transfer performances through air and animal tissues were investigated. The effect of antenna misalignment and bending were considered and validated for reliable wireless energy harvesting. The safety of wireless power transfer was shown with a long exposure temperature study. Finally, world's first flexible gastrostimulator was demonstrated with animal studies in rat and porcine model.