Innovative Design and Manufacturing Techniques for Patient Specific Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm Flexible Benchtop Models

Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) represents an asymptomatic cardiovascular type of disease, that is diagnosed in elder people over 60 years old. It is characterised by a ballooning of the abdominal aorta, which grows, at different rates in different patients. If left untreated, it will rupture causing severe internal bleeding, which can lead to shock or death [1]. Medical devices such as bifurcated stent grafts (SG) are used for the treatment of this disease. To help improve SG performance, biomedical engineers design benchtop models for testing.