For patients requiring haemodialysis, clinical practice guidelines strongly recommend the arteriovenous fistula (AVF) as the preferred vascular access. However, there are instances when fistula creation is not possible for the vein, or the fistula does not mature. The Artio Medical Inc. Amplifi™ vein Dilation System is being developed for use prior to AVF creation to enhance the suitability of the vein for fistula creation and raise its probability of maturation. The Amplifi™ is a wearable motor-pump that extracts non-pulsatile blood from the right atrium and achieves vein dilation through a controlled increase in blood flow rates and thus in shear stress at the vessel’s wall. These higher flow rates must be within a range to produce approximately 4 pascals of shear stress on the vessel’s wall to achieve the desired dilatation and wall thickness to promote fistula development. The aims of this project were: 1) to estimate wall shear stress (WSS) during vein dilation (for the “External” control algorithm) and 2) to optimise the Amplifi™ System’s controller (the “Internal” control algorithm) for minimum vibration and maximum power efficiency. Apart from the vibration and power consumption aims, additional optimisation goals were to implement an increased speed range and ramped speed function in flow (from 0.1 L/min to 1 L/min) over a 14-day period. […]