Two new publications report on use of PleuraFlow technology

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Cardiac surgeons at the Montreal Heart Institute have published a report featured in the Annals of Thoracic Surgery detailing how active clearance of chest tubes in the intensive care unit non-surgically treated a life-threatening episode of pericardial tamponade in a patient recovering from heart surgery.

In the report, the intensive care unit clinicians used the PleuraFlow active clearance technology system (ClearFlow) to re-establish chest tube patency and provide relief for a patient who developed tamponade.

“This published case illustrates how quickly tamponade can develop early during recovery, and how important it is to be able to quickly re-establish chest tube patency and maintain maximum blood evacuation capacity in the intensive care unit,” says Ed Boyle, a cardiothoracic surgeon and co-founder & chairman of ClearFlow.

This comes shortly after the publication of a new study in the Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery by independent investigators in Germany. This study affirmed a reduction in retained blood syndrome required after surgery from 20% to 11% (43% reduction) in all cardiac surgery patients when PleuraFlow was used, as well as a reduction in post-operative atrial fibrillation (POAF) from 30% to 20% (a 33% reduction) in propensity matched patients.

“This peer-reviewed report again shows how keeping chest tubes free of clot in early recovery after cardiac surgery not only reduces complications and costs, but also can save lives,” says Paul Molloy, chief executive officer of ClearFlow.

The PleuraFlow active clearance technology system is approved for use in Europe, Australia, Brazil, the USA and Canada, and has either cleared or is pending clearance in about a dozen additional countries.