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Q & A
Everything you wanted to know about GTx and more…
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Image-guided therapeutics
in the operating room |
What kinds of benefits are associated with image-guided approaches?
Often it is the case that intervention is a balance between removing the disease and maintaining normal function. The presence of uncertainty often forces the clinician to make the difficult choice between full resection and the risk of side effects. Image-guided approaches serve to minimize these uncertainties by providing valuable information as the therapy progresses, leading to more successful interventions and fewer side effects.
Can we afford to perform image-guided procedures on every patient?
Can we afford not to? Early adoption of these technologies will accelerate the development of cost-effective models of use for the benefit of all.
How is it possible to look inside the body with image-guided procedures?
The right combination of physics, electronics, and computing allows us to generate images of internal anatomy and function. Imaging allows us to generate images of internal anatomy and function. Imaging systems usually work by either passing something through the body and watching for what comes out the other side (x-ray, CT) or by exciting something in the body and “listening” for emissions (MR, PET).
Why can’t we use conventional diagnostic imaging systems to guide therapy?
We often do. For treatment sites that are very stable, we can rely on images from a day or two before the surgery to be representative of the anatomy at the time of intervention. However, in many situations, this is not the case. For example, during surgery when the anatomy is being modified, images from even an hour earlier would clearly not be accurate. Having images generated as the therapy progresses is the only way to assure the desired accuracy.
How long before the image-guidance approach can be the standard?
There are a variety of new imaging and computing technologies that will make image-guided procedures the standard over the next 10 years. These developments promise to increase the quality and consistency of intervention. Our challenge is to accelerate the adoption of these approaches for the benefit of the patients and to be on the frontier as these new paradigms change the face of oncology intervention.
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