Pediatric heart patients often need major surgeries to repair congenital heart defects or replace worn-out devices. But their relatively small market means it’s typically an underserved audience for medical innovation.
Medtronic recently developed a new transcatheter pulmonary valve that helps doctors nonsurgically implant a heart valve in children. Instead of opening a patient’s chest, physicians make an incision in the leg and guide a catheter through the body’s cardiovascular system to insert the valve.
Tim Laske led the team that developed Medtronic’s Melody® Transcatheter Pulmonary Valve. Laske, senior product development director, worked on the project for three years, heading a 21-person group of physiologists, biologists, engineers, material scientists, physicians, and regulatory experts.
“The biggest challenge was bringing together the team to create the valve—a diverse group in different locations around the country and the globe. We had technical and interpersonal challenges we needed to overcome,” he says. “But here we are, solving a problem for children with congenital heart defects. It’s tremendously rewarding.”
Medtronic has lauded Laske’s work, awarding him four Star of Excellence honors and in 2005 naming him a Bakken Fellow.
Laske’s influence on the biomedical industry has been felt deeply in many other quarters. The Visible Heart Lab is an accomplishment that stands out for Laske: a Medtronic/University of Minnesota team developed a way to keep a human or mammalian heart alive outside of the body. Doctors and scientists use the self-standing, beating heart to view working valves and structures from the inside and to test biomedical therapies.
Laske served as one of two principal scientific contributors to the Visible Heart under the direction of the University’s Paul Iaizzo.
Additionally, Laske has earned 45 patents during his stints at Medtronic and Ford Motor Company, where he worked as an engineer in crash safety.
Laske initially aimed to be a wildlife biologist, so he enjoys working on a Medtronic initiative involving black bears. The project, a partnership between Medtronic, the University, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, and the University of Wyoming, studies hibernating black bears to understand how they survive the winter. The team wants to apply what they learn from the bears’ heart rhythms to treating heart failure and rhythm management in humans. “My three daughters have found this to be an OK project because someone needs to hold the cubs while we do our work,” says Laske, “and they are quite pleased to do that.”
Though there are opportunities for Laske to apply his knowledge and skills at a biomedical start-up, he is happiest at Medtronic, where he can have a bigger influence on a breadth of products. Part of his job involves talking with entrepreneurs about their inventions and exploring whether there are opportunities for collaboration. Laske adds, “I feel like I can contribute a lot more this way.”
