Tustin Hospital Launches New Prostate Treatment; UCI Links Virus, ALS
Micro Therapeutics Inc., an Irvine medical-device company, has completed two brain aneurysm procedures using the company’s new product, the Onyx Liquid Embolic System (LES). It marks the beginning of the company’s U.S. clinical trials involving 10 patients.
The surgeries were performed by Dr. Michel Mawad, chief of neuroradiology at Methodist Hospital in Houston. The Onyx liquid is delivered to the site of the aneurysm,a weakening of the artery wall,and then becomes a solid but flexible mass, closing off the defective part of the blood vessel.
Some benefits of Onyx LES include shorter procedure and recovery times, according to a company press release.
“It’s going to offer interventional radiologists a wider option in treating aneurysm patients. We can offer patients a less-traumatic method,” said president and CEO George Wallace.
Currently, there are two ways to treat aneurysms: surgery and intravenous insertion of a coil.
The company will add to data already gathered from 15 procedures performed in Europe and the Middle East. Those trials began in September at Foundation Rothschild in Paris. Micro Therapeutics hopes to get approval to expand trials to six centers nationwide, involving some 250 patients.
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Dr. Stephen W. Doggett, a physician at Tustin Hospital and Medical Center says he’s the first practitioner of a new system of treatment for prostate cancer outside of Harvard Medical School, where the new method was developed. The process is called Intraoperative Treatment Planning for Prostate Cancer Brachytherapy. Brachytherapy, or radiation seed implant, has a lower incidence of side effects such as impotency and incontinence associated with radiation and invasive surgery, according to Doggett.
The difference between original brachytherapy and the new method is the number of steps involved. The old method takes ultrasound views of the prostate several weeks prior to surgery. The views are then hand entered into a treatment-planning computer and generated. The plan is then used to guide the seed placement. Because there are so many steps, with several people entering information, the likelihood of an error occurring is higher. With surgery sometimes weeks away, the cancer could change position and size.
The new system: the doctor puts an ultrasound probe in which sends image and data into the computer at surgery time. The computer program makes three million calculations in 20 seconds, Doggett said.
“Last year there were 180,000 new cases of prostate cancer,” he said. “This technology from a market standpoint is a huge market.”
The software is commercially available through Burdette Medical Systems of Champaigne, Ill., which worked in conjunction with Harvard Medical School.
UCI College of Medicine recently discovered a virus in the spinal cords of patients suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. The findings, which were published in the January issue of Neurology, may help scientists develop new classes of drugs to treat the disease.
Martina Berger, a UCI researcher, along with a team of colleagues at the Rockefeller University in Lyon, France, found that 15 of 17 victims of ALS had a virus in the motor nerve cells of their spinal cords, while the virus was found in only one of 29 people who died of other diseases.
The virus was similar to Echovirus-7, which is known to cause meningitis and rare cases of encephalitis.
“Many researchers have suspected a viral link to ALS, but in this study we were able to identify a virus known for nerve damage in the exact areas of the nervous system that are affected by this disease,” Berger said.
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Bits and pieces:
Nobel Biocare USA Inc.,Yorba Linda, announced the opening of a new facility in Fair Lawn, N.J. to manufacture dental restoration materials and implants such as dental crowns, bridges and porcelain veneers. Company officials estimate the new plant will manufacture some 5,000 crowns a day Cardiac Science Inc. has signed a licensing and development agreement with HeartSine Technologies to incorporate HeartSine’s biphasic waveform technology into the cardiac arrest detection and defibrillation module Cardiac Science is developing. Cardiac Science paid HeartSine $250,000 in the deal.
