Would be nice, right? Well, it’s been around for a while. The gamma-knife. High energy radiation.
But what if there was an alternative without radiation? What if you could operate on a brain without opening the skull?
The complications like infection and the cost of that surgery and hospital stays would be far fewer and shorter.
Well, Insightec is doing just that with MRI guided high-intensity ultrasound technology.
In fact, there are centers in Europe and the Americas already hard at work relieving the pain from bone metastases (cancer which has spread to the bone), and destroying uterine fibroids without surgery and without removing the uterus.
In fact, there have been patients with Familial Tremor who have been returned to normal immediately upon receiving treatment.
What is so great is that non ionizing radiation (in the form of ultrasound) won’t expose the patient to any cancer linked radiation. The ultrasound energy does its work by destroying the offending tissue with thermal energy.
The benefits:
- Short recovery time, fast symptom relief
- Non-invasive, non-ionizing treatment with minimal discomfort and trauma
- One session, drug-sparing, no hospitalization
- No incisions, scars, post-operative complications or long-term consequences
- Preserving fertility, sexual function, continence, aesthetics
You can read about the current applications here: http://us.insightec.com/ExAblate-uterine-fibroids.html
and here: http://us.insightec.com/bone-mets-pain-reduction.html
There are also videos at the foot of this page: http://us.insightec.com/
What is so interesting is that from diagnosis to ultimate treatment the body is not invaded. I like that.
Also, the treatment of epilepsy and all sorts of other illnesses might be far better accomplished this way than by traditional surgery.