Method for promoting circulation of blood

Claim 1

A method for promoting circulation of blood through a patient's heart and extremity comprising the steps of: a) applying an inflatable enclosure to the extremity, so that upon inflation and deflation of the enclosure, the extremity is alternately compressed and decompressed; b) sensing a QRS complex in a heart cycle of the patient and computing an average time period between a selected number of successive sensed QRS complexes in successive heart cycles of the patient; c) initiating a timing cycle for compressing and decompressing said extremity, said timing cycle being comprised of an adjustable time delay, a compression period and a decompression period, said timing cycle being calculated relative to said average time period, said timing cycle being initiated at a QRS complex following said selected number of successive sensed QRS complexes; d) inflating the inflatable enclosure at the end of said time delay following the initiation of said timing cycle, thereby effecting compression of the extremity at the conclusion of the time delay; e) maintaining said inflation of the inflatable enclosure over said compression period and deflating the inflatable enclosure to initiate said decompression period after said compression period; and f) controlling said timing cycle relative to said average time period so as to initiate said decompression period sufficiently late in said heart cycle to facilitate both entry of a QRS-associated pulse wave into said extremity and ventricular ejection of blood from said heart, but before a next occurring QRS complex, thereby promoting circulation of blood through said heart and said extremity of the patient.

Claim 2

A method for promoting circulation of blood through a patient's heart and extremity comprising the steps of: a) applying an inflatable enclosure to the extremity, so that upon inflation and deflation of the enclosure, the extremity is alternately compressed and decompressed; b) sensing a QRS complex in a heart cycle of the patient and computing an average time period between a selected number of successive sensed QRS complexes in successive heart cycles of the patient; c) initiating a timing cycle for compressing and decompressing said extremity, said timing cycle being comprised of an adjustable time delay, a compression period and a decompression period, said timing cycle being calculated relative to said average time period, said timing cycle being initiated at a QRS complex following said selected number of successive sensed QRS complexes; d) inflating the inflatable enclosure at the end of said time delay following the initiation of said timing cycle, thereby effecting compression of the extremity at the conclusion of the time delay; e) maintaining said inflation of the inflatable enclosure over said compression period and deflating the inflatable enclosure to initiate said decompression period after said compression period; and f) controlling said timing cycle relative to said average time period so as to initiate said decompression period sufficiently late in said heart cycle to facilitate both entry of a QRS-associated pulse wave into said extremity and ventricular ejection of blood from said heart, but before a next occurring QRS complex, thereby promoting circulation of blood through said heart and said extremity of the patient.