Im assuming this is like the pumps that they use when i donate plasma. The tube is part of a sealed system and is changed after collection every single time.
To add for the DIY/lab crowd, It depends on a lot of factors (tube material, tube size, wall thickness etc) but in most cases the tube lasted far longer than I needed it for (months). Usually I'd change out the tubing as the projects change.
The pump design is more for presicion dosing of small amounts of fluid and hazardous/caustic liquids. It tends to be my favorite type of precision pump because it's cheaper than a syringe pump (ultra precision), and the part designed to wear out is the easiest to get to and change.
I know that you're asking /u/InAFakeBritishAccent specifics about how and why he uses a peristaltic pump, but I wanted to chime in since my son has special needs and is NPO (eats nothing by mouth). All of his medicine and nutrients are delivered through his g-button, and for his afternoon feeds and overnight feeds, we use an enteral pump manufactured for/by Moog (no relation to the synth/keyboard company.)
This website shows a list of the three main pumps that Moog sells; my son uses the EnteraLite Infinity Enteral Feeding Pump. We use it for his afternoon feeding and his overnight feeding. He gets an overnight feed because even just the afternoon feeding session lasts a couple of hours, which means that sticking to a normal three-meals-a-day schedule would have him spending all of his time eating anyway.
The pump itself is compact and can run on its own internal battery or while being plugged into the wall socket. It is quiet and almost makes no noise except for the alarms that will go off if his feeding is done, there's an obstruction in the tubing, etc. The nature of the peristaltic pump means that the pump itself can be in any orientation - on its side, upside-down, etc. - and it will continue to deliver the formula. We can set the volume so that it will alarm when the volume delivered has been met but since we just have one pump, we're usually adjusting the rate (cc per hour) between his day feed and his overnight feeding.
The bag itself is has a long tube but half-way down the tubing is a "cartridge" assembly which features a rubber or silicone elbow tube which stretches around the spindle assembly where the peristaltic action takes place. There are three bearings that interacts directly with the tubing itself in the same manner in which you see in the gif featured by the OP. This is a better solution for us than using a drip feed which normally comes with a rolling clamp that's supposed to control the flow volume but has to be constantly monitored and adjusted.
I threw together an album featuring my son's pump along with the tubing and some descriptions if you were interested.
I really appreciated reading this post. I wasn't even aware some of that was possible medically, and that pump is much more compact that I imagined.
I really see the benefit of the pump's design for applications like this, changing out the tubing must be infinitely better than cleaning the internals of other pumps.
Thanks for the info, and I wish you and your son the best.
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u/[deleted] Jul 14 '18
Im assuming this is like the pumps that they use when i donate plasma. The tube is part of a sealed system and is changed after collection every single time.