Computer simulation of cervical tissue response to a hydraulic dilator device

BACKGROUND: Classical mechanical dilators for cervical dilation are associated with various complications, such as uterine perforation, cervical laceration, infections and intraperitoneal hemorrhage. A new medical device called continuous controllable balloon dilator (CCBD) was constructed to make a significant reduction in all of the side effects of traditional mechanical dilation. METHOD: In this study we investigated numerically the cervical canal tissue response for Hegar and CCBD using our poroelastic finite element model and in-house software development. Boundary conditions for pressure loading on the tissue for both dilators in vivo were measured experimentally. Material properties of the cervical tissue were fitted with experimental in vivo data of pressure and fluid volume or balloon size. RESULTS: Obtained results for effective stresses inside the cervical tissue clearly showed higher stresses for Hegar dilator during dilation in comparison with our CCBD. CONCLUSION: This study opens a new avenue for the implementation of CCBD device instead of mechanical dilators to prevent cervical injury during cervical dilation.