Robotic Guided Coronary Intervention

Calendar January 25, 2023 | Posted by admin

University Hospitals Galway (UHG) in Ireland has carried out the first Robotic Guided Coronary Intervention. The innovative procedure combines the benefits of coronary intervention with the precision of robotics, offering a range of benefits to patients. The new technology is used in stent procedures to relieve blockages in the arteries of the heart. It allows for greater precision in positioning stents, allowing the Interventional Cardiologists to move the stent a millimetre at a time.

It also allows the medical team to have an enhanced, close up view of the angiographic images and information during the entire procedure. The scientific breakthrough allows Interventional Cardiologists to use the robot as an extension of their own hand, allowing for robotic precision and details visualization when positioning of guide catheters, guidewires and balloon/stent catheters.

“Robotic innovation has come a long way in the last decade. And we in Galway are delighted to have performed the first Robotic Guided Coronary Intervention in Ireland and the UK.”, said Prof Faisal Sharif, who carried out the first procedure in UHG. The Consultant Cardiologist welcomed the addition of the CorPath Robotic Angioplasy as a game changer.

“The main advantage of robotics is that it is safe and very precise in stent placement. It allows the accurate placement for up to 1mm at a time,” he said. The use of robotics in the procedure will also benefit staff, reducing their exposure to radiation. “Traditionally, the coronary stent placement procedure is performed in the Cardiac Cath Lab resulting in staff  exposure to radiation. The second main advantage of using Robotics is the  reduction in radiation exposure for the staff.”

“We recently successfully completed the first case and going forward we will be performing these procedures regularly,” added Prof Sharif.

Source: https://www.saolta.ie/

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Lasers and Ultrasound Combine to Pulverize Arterial Plaque

Calendar May 27, 2022 | Posted by admin

Lasers are one of the tools physicians can lean on to tackle plaque buildup on arterial walls, but current approaches carry a risk of complications and can be limited in their effectiveness. By bringing ultrasound into the mix, scientists at the University of Kansas have demonstrated a new take on this treatment that relies on exploding microbubbles to destroy plaque with greater safety and efficiency, while hinting at some unique long-term advantages.

Scientists have demonstrated a new technique to take out arterial plaque, using low-power lasers and ultrasound to break it apart with tiny bubbles

The novel ultrasound-assisted laser technique builds off what’s known as laser angioplasty, an existing treatment designed to improve blood flow in patients suffering from plaque buildup that narrows the arteries. Where more conventional treatments such as stents and balloon angioplasty expand the artery and compress the plaque, laser angioplasty destroys it to eliminate the blockage.

The laser is inserted into the artery with a catheter, and the thermal energy it generates turns water in the artery into a vapor bubble that expands, collapses and breaks up the plaque. Because this technique calls for high-power lasers, it has the potential to perforate or dissect the artery, something the scientists are looking to avoid by using low-power lasers instead.

They were able to do so in pork belly samples and ex vivo samples of artery plaque with the help of ultrasound. The method uses a low-power nanosecond pulsed laser to generate microbubbles, and applying ultrasound to the artery then causes these microbubbles to expand, collapse and disrupt the plaque.

“In conventional laser angioplasty, a high laser power is required for the entire cavitation process, whereas in our technology, a lower laser power is only required for initiating the cavitation process,” said team member Rohit Singh. “Overall, the combination of ultrasound and laser reduces the need for laser power and improves the efficiency of atherosclerotic plaque removal.”

The mix of lasers and ultrasound has shown potential in other areas of medicine, with Singh and his colleagues pursuing similar therapies to tackle abnormal microvessels in the eye that cause blindness and blood clots in the veins. We’ve also seen ultrasound used to explode tiny bubbles in cancer research, providing a way of wiping out cancerous cells within a tumor.

Source: https://newatlas.com/

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