A new study has found that electric vehicle chargers are safe for people with pacemakers and defibrillators. This was revealed today in a journal from the European Society of Cardiology and also presented at an ESC congress called EHRA 2023.
Dr. Carsten Lennerz from the German Heart Centre Munich said that using electric car chargers can be dangerous because they create electromagnetic fields which can cause pacemakers and defibrillators to malfunction. His research showed that the most powerful part of these fields comes from the charging cable itself. This study looked at how powerful chargers could affect people with heart problems who were using them.
Pacemakers and defibrillators are tools used to help people with heart issues or problems. It is estimated that, by 2023, around 1–1.4 million people will have a pacemaker implanted. This means that in the world, there will be close to 8-12 million people living with one! Additionally, every year, around 150–200 thousand patients get an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD).
High-power chargers that allow charging times to be a lot faster have been developed. These chargers use Direct Current (DC) electricity, which allows it to charge more quickly than other types like Alternating Current (AC). However, this also creates a stronger magnetic field and possibly more electro-magnetic interference near where it’s being used. This could make medical devices, like pacemakers or defibrillators, malfunction – either switch off or wrongly give ‘shock therapy’ – since they will interpret the interference as an irregular heartbeat. There is still no clear guidance on what the rules should be for using these high-power chargers with people who rely on these medical devices.
The study involved 130 people who had a pacemaker or defibrillator implanted in them. Most of them (59 years old on average) were adults, and about one-fifth (21%) of the participants were female. The researchers used 4 electric cars that weren’t powerful enough to get maximum power from the chargers (350 kW). To test out what would happen if more powerful cars came along, they also tested out a special vehicle which could use up all of the 350 kW charge.
The people in the study had their electronic heart devices programmed so that they could be more easily detect interference. Then, they plugged in and charged each car directly above the heart device to make sure it was sensitive enough to pick up any kind of interference. Everyone’s heartbeat was checked throughout this process to make sure that their devices weren’t malfunctioning or sensing unusually fast heart rhythms. Afterward, the heart device was examined again for any changes or damage after having charged the cars.
The researchers did 561 tests, and they found there were no bad side effects caused by electric signals. The pacemakers didn’t have any problems, and people with defibrillators wouldn’t get sudden shocks that would hurt them.
Dr. Lennerz said that during a study to see if high-powered chargers could cause any problems with devices used by patients with heart problems, they found no issues at all. This means that it’s safe to use high-powered chargers with these types of medical devices and there’s no need to restrict their use in any way.
He talked about a research that only looked at superfast charging instead of regular home chargers. He explained that when you use a regular charger the current is lower and it produces a different magnetic field than the one produced by something that charges quickly. To stay safe while charging at home, he said you should not be close to your charger for too long.
Dr. Lennerz says you don’t need to worry if your pacemaker or defibrillator gets exposed to electric car charging. The chances of it messing up are super small. It’s also ok if you sit inside the car or stand near the charger while your car is charging, but make sure the cable isn’t close to your device.
On April 17th, 2023 at 3:40pm Central European Summer Time (CEST), a group of researchers will give a presentation to talk about if high-power chargers for electric cars are safe for people with pacemakers or defibrillators. The presentation can be found in the ‘Device Therapy – ICD’ section in the Europace journal and is called ‘Electric cars and high power chargers: Are they safe for patients with cardiac implantable electronic devices?’
A group of medical experts wrote a study called “Patients with pacemakers or defibrillators do not need to worry about e-Cars” which was published in the journal Technol Health Care on 13 January 2020. This study concluded that it is safe for people with these kinds of implants to use electric cars. The authors of this report are Carsten Lennerz, Lorenz Horlbeck, Severin Weigand, Christian Grebmer, Patrick Blazek, Amir Brkic, Verena Semmler, Bernhard Haller, Tilko Reents, Gabriele Hessling, Isabel Deisenhofer, Markus Lienkamp, Christof Kolb and Matthew O’Connor.
