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Thread: Artificial Hearts

  1. Artificial Hearts

    Hi Everyone,

    I am currently in my first year of sixth form and am completing an extended project on the future of artificial hearts. A part of this project will include religious and ethical views on the devices.

    There are two types of these defices: ones with a constant flow (i.e. they don't beat or pump as a human heart would), and ones which have a pumping action.

    If you have any opinion on this, as in if you would have one if needed as opposed to a transplant or if you think that making something like this is right, I would greatly appreciate your comments, from both a religious and personal point of view.

    Thankyou for your help.

    Laura Myers

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    Re: Artificial Hearts

    Hi Laura,

    From a personal point of view, I'd say that such a creation would greatly benefit mankind. But does this artificial heart ever stop? We know that a person is officially 'dead' when the heart stops beating for a prolonged period of time. If this heart goes on beating , while the brain and other parts of the body are dead and start decaying, when would they be considered dead?

    In other words, there are both negative and positive effects.

    From a religious point of view, it definitely meddles with the natural cycle of life, besides interfering with God's duty. We know that every single one of us has a set period of time to live on Earth, before God calls us back. If one still intends to live longer than that given period, then it makes me wonder where we are heading to. It's similar to the 'cloning' issue, which sparked many religious debates.

    Maybe it's just God's way of giving us some advancement and excitement?
    Or maybe allowing us to become more self-sufficient, though it is still He who controls everything?

    Makes me wonder.

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    Re: Artificial Hearts

    namaskar,
    From personal or religious point of view, I have no issues with this.

    To my simple engineering mind, human heart is simply a pump. If the artificial heart can be made with constant flow I think that would be a better option, less points of failure but the one with pumping action will be good too.

    No Issues.

    Quote Originally Posted by LauraMyers View Post
    Hi Everyone,

    I am currently in my first year of sixth form and am completing an extended project on the future of artificial hearts. A part of this project will include religious and ethical views on the devices.

    There are two types of these defices: ones with a constant flow (i.e. they don't beat or pump as a human heart would), and ones which have a pumping action.

    If you have any opinion on this, as in if you would have one if needed as opposed to a transplant or if you think that making something like this is right, I would greatly appreciate your comments, from both a religious and personal point of view.

    Thankyou for your help.

    Laura Myers
    satay

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    Re: Artificial Hearts

    Namaste,

    The flow is either through a pump or through gravity. So, this constant flow thing without a pump - I don't understand. What makes the flow constant, if not a pump in conjunction with some other mechanical gadgetry?

    I just saw a bumper sticker which said:
    'I gave you science to see me, NOT to deny me' - God

    Personal opinion: If God enabled engineers and medical professionals to design and build some devices for the use of God's creation, what could be wrong with that? God made the medical establishment available to me, that is per my karma. So I am not the one artificially prolonging my life, but He is through the professionals that He made and sent to my aid. If He gave us the intelligence to go beyond where nature stops, who would you blame - humans for exercising that intelligence, or God for giving it to us? I feel as comfortable flying as I would using an artificial heart - both being the products of same God given human intelligence. So, at a personal level, I embrace everything that helps mankind improve or prolong the human life, it is all through His army of people and per my karma. Science is HIS gift and not man made.

    Theological opinion: I will let the brahmins take a shot at that.

    Pranam.
    Last edited by Believer; 23 June 2012 at 01:39 AM.

  5. #5

    Re: Artificial Hearts

    Quote Originally Posted by LauraMyers View Post
    Hi Everyone,

    I am currently in my first year of sixth form and am completing an extended project on the future of artificial hearts. A part of this project will include religious and ethical views on the devices.

    There are two types of these defices: ones with a constant flow (i.e. they don't beat or pump as a human heart would), and ones which have a pumping action.

    If you have any opinion on this, as in if you would have one if needed as opposed to a transplant or if you think that making something like this is right, I would greatly appreciate your comments, from both a religious and personal point of view.

    Thankyou for your help.

    Laura Myers
    Namaste,

    From a personal point of view, I think an artificial heart is a great idea - it would save a lot of lives as so many people die from lack of a suitable heart to transplant.

    Religiously I can't comment that far as I am a novice to Hinduism so I can't speak with authority. However, I can't see any issues with it as
    Vishvakarma is the "architect of the gods" and I would consider it something he would aporove of - Also Saraswati, wife of Brahman I would consider to help the inspiration of all the scientists involved in the development of the heart.

    Pranams.

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    Re: Artificial Hearts

    I'm all for artificial organs, however, I would consider biological organs to be superior.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_culture


    But paramount in importance is:
    1. Making sure people who need them have an adequate supply of replacement organs.
    2. Stopping the hideous black market organ trade - and what it involves.

  7. #7

    Re: Artificial Hearts

    Quote Originally Posted by Shuddhasattva View Post
    I'm all for artificial organs, however, I would consider biological organs to be superior.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_culture


    But paramount in importance is:
    1. Making sure people who need them have an adequate supply of replacement organs.
    2. Stopping the hideous black market organ trade - and what it involves.
    Namaste.

    I wonder if eventually medical science could progress so much that we could be able to have hearts grown for us?

    I know it's possible to grow skin and other flesh in a lab (a couple of years ago, Spanish scientists completed a larynx transplant using a donor organ as a "scaffold" and the persons' own cells were grown on to the flesh to stop rejection) so maybe one day this could be done to stop the shortage.

    Pranams.

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    Re: Artificial Hearts

    Namaste

    "A new kind of solution is incubating in medical labs: "bioartificial" organs grown from the patient's own cells. Thirty people have received lab-grown bladders already, and other engineered organs are in the pipeline. The bladder technique was developed by Anthony Atala of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Researchers take healthy cells from a patient's diseased bladder, cause them to multiply profusely in petri dishes, then apply them to a balloon-shaped scaffold made partly of collagen, the protein found in cartilage. Muscle cells go on the outside, urothelial cells (which line the urinary tract) on the inside. "It's like baking a layer cake," says Atala. "You're layering the cells one layer at a time, spreading these toppings." The bladder-to-be is then incubated at body temperature until the cells form functioning tissue. The whole process takes six to eight weeks.
    Solid organs with lots of blood vessels, such as kidneys or livers, are harder to grow than hollow ones like bladders. But Atala's group—which is working on 22 organs and tissues, including ears—recently made a functioning piece of human liver. One tool they use is similar to an ink-jet printer; it "prints" different types of cells and the organ scaffold one layer at a time.
    Other labs are also racing to make bioartificial organs. A jawbone has sprouted at Columbia University and a lung at Yale. At the University of Minnesota, Doris Taylor has fabricated a beating rat heart, growing cells from one rat on a scaffold she made from the heart of another by washing off its own cells. And at the University of Michigan, H. David Humes has created an artificial kidney from cells seeded onto a synthetic scaffold. The cell-phone-size kidney has passed tests on sheep—it's not yet implantable, but it's wearable, unlike a dialysis machine, and it does more than filter toxins from blood. It also makes hormones and performs other kidney functions.
    Growing a copy of a patient's organ may not always be possible—for instance, when the original is too damaged by cancer. One solution for such patients might be a stem cell bank. Atala's team has shown that stem cells can be collected without harming human embryos (and thus without political controversy) from amniotic fluid in the womb. The researchers have coaxed those cells into becoming heart, liver, and other organ cells. A bank of 100,000 stem cell samples, Atala says, would have enough genetic variety to match nearly any patient. Surgeons would order organs grown as needed instead of waiting for cadavers that might not be a perfect match"

    http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/20...eneration-text

  9. Re: Artificial Hearts

    Quote Originally Posted by Believer View Post
    Namaste,

    The flow is either through a pump or through gravity. So, this constant flow thing without a pump - I don't understand. What makes the flow constant, if not a pump in conjunction with some other mechanical gadgetry?

    I just saw a bumper sticker which said:
    'I gave you science to see me, NOT to deny me' - God

    Personal opinion: If God enabled engineers and medical professionals to design and build some devices for the use of God's creation, what could be wrong with that? God made the medical establishment available to me, that is per my karma. So I am not the one artificially prolonging my life, but He is through the professionals that He made and sent to my aid. If He gave us the intelligence to go beyond where nature stops, who would you blame - humans for exercising that intelligence, or God for giving it to us? I feel as comfortable flying as I would using an artificial heart - both being the products of same God given human intelligence. So, at a personal level, I embrace everything that helps mankind improve or prolong the human life, it is all through His army of people and per my karma. Science is HIS gift and not man made.

    Theological opinion: I will let the brahmins take a shot at that.

    Pranam.
    What I meant by constant flow is that you wouldn't have a heart that had a beat. If you tested for someones pulse, it would seem to be as though they didn't have one. Sorry for not making this clear

  10. Re: Artificial Hearts

    Quote Originally Posted by mradam83 View Post
    Namaste.

    I wonder if eventually medical science could progress so much that we could be able to have hearts grown for us?

    I know it's possible to grow skin and other flesh in a lab (a couple of years ago, Spanish scientists completed a larynx transplant using a donor organ as a "scaffold" and the persons' own cells were grown on to the flesh to stop rejection) so maybe one day this could be done to stop the shortage.

    Pranams.
    This is currently a work in process. We can essentually 'vaccuum' cells out of a heart, leaving just the bare skeleton, and grow a new one using stem cells. Unfortunately, this is currently a very expensive and untested method.

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