Superior Performance is Delivered at Utmost Safety and an Affordable Price!
The Compact Disposable Unit (CDU) is where the warming ‘magic’ takes place. After connecting a CDU to the blood or IV tubing, priming the tubing and CDU, and attaching the primed CDU to the Base Unit, either directly or with an Extension Cable, cold-stored blood or blood components or room temperature fluids will reach normothermic temperature in a few seconds, even at very high resuscitation rates.
The fluid path is aluminum-free. It is composed of a 220 cm / 7.2 ft medical grade stainless steel coil and PVC tubing (together, proximal luer to distal luer, the total priming volume of the stainless-steel coil and PVC tubing is 19 ml). Temperature sensors are attached along the fluid path and all components are enclosed in an expanded polypropylene foam (EPP) casing. The EPP casing is robust, affordable, and lightweight, with remarkable insulating properties.
The sensors communicate the blood or fluid’s temperature to the Base Unit a few hundred times per second. Based on these readings, the Base Unit continuously assesses whether to increase, decrease, or maintain the warming level to ensure a 38°C output (±2°C). The CDU can sustain immense pressure; based on third-party testing, the CDU was able to withstand 175 PSI; which is 25 times the requirement of the standard! This pressure handling capability, along with the comfortable amount of priming volume, real-time sensing, utmost heat transfer efficiency, and sufficient battery capacity, allow the Warrior models to outperform competitive options when rapid intermittent bolus flows are applied (e.g., through methods such as push-pull, hand pump, syringe, or other flow-inducing devices such as LifeFlow™).
There are a few additional benefits related to the CDU’s design, for example:
- Undisrupted Fluid Path: The CDU’s fluid path is undisrupted in the sense that it has the same internal diameter as your line, and it has very smooth curves. This design ensures minimal structural impact on the flow, such as abrupt turns, connection points, and flow changes, which is then translated into low sheer force, minimal turbulences, no cavitation, and no air bubble formation, to name just a few benefits.
- Incremental Heat Transfer: With 4,150 mm² warming surface, the CDU has one of the most relaxed heat transfer processes in the industry.
- Designed to Not Exceed 38°C: Unlike most warming technologies and due to its extremely high efficiency, the CDU’s heating element is designed to not exceed 38°C.
- No Heating Inertia: Once the heating stops, the heating element cools down immediately.
- Aluminum-Free: By using common warming elements (i.e., medical grade stainless steel coil), we were able to eliminate toxicity concerns that may be traced for example in aluminum warmers.
- Designed for Manufacturability: Due to the simple implementation of the underlying technology, the CDU availability is unlikely to be impacted by surge in demand or sudden supply constraints.
- Designed for Cost: The CDU design facilitates the lowest consumable cost among all modern battery-operated warmers.
Finally, the CDU technology has been perfected over >100,000 utilizations.