Development and in vivo testing of a chronic percutaneous prosthesis

Significant progress has been made in the development of a percutaneous energy transmission system (PETS) designed to provide energy to intracorporeally implanted blood pumps for up to 2 years. The mean survival of our six most recent PETS implantations was 351 +/- 33 days. Four of these were explanted electively after a full year of implantation. Sinus formation around each prosthesis was limited by a biomaterial seal at the sinus termination point. The results support the hypothesis that collagen inhibits epidermal downgrowth. Continued development of systems based on this hypothesis is desirable.