Our Oncology Business
The scourge of Cancer
Worldwide, there are over 10 million new incidences of cancer and more than 6 million deaths from cancer annually. Despite a lower overall population, about half of these incidences (4.7 million) occur in more developed countries because of longer life expectancies. In developed countries cancer is the second most common cause of death.
Despite an ever increasing focus on addressing cancer, cancer mortality rates have not changed dramatically between 1950 and 2002, and in the next 10 years, cancer will cause the death of over 84 million people worldwide.
In liver cancer there are over 600,000 new incidences every year worldwide. Tumour resection (surgical removal) is the only treatment that offers a potential cure. This is normally combined with chemotherapy and other drug therapies. However resection is often impossible due to the presence of multiple tumours or because the patients are not fit enough for such invasive procedures. In liver cancer only around 20% of patients are suitable for a tumour resection.
Tumour Ablation solutions
Tumour ablation involves passing a probe to the centre of a tumour where heat from the probe tip creates a spherical volume of dead tissue that encompasses the tumour. Hitherto no ablative tools have been widely used in open surgical procedures because of the unacceptably long treatment times. By allowing tumours to be either ablated or resected in the same procedure the speed and power of microwave ablation should significantly increase the percentage of patients suitable for resection. For the balance of patients there remains no curative treatment option.
Percutaneous ablation is a method of destroying tumours in patients not fit for an open surgical procedure. Ultrasound, CT or MRI guidance is used to pass a needle probe through the skin to the target site. With current technology however, tumours return at the site of the ablation in 30% of cases and the procedure can take several hours consuming expensive human and physical resources. Our percutaneous probe overcomes the significant clinical shortcomings and financial inefficiencies of current RFA systems.
Pioneering work from Microsulis
Our Research at the UoB has resulted in a 1.8mm diameter high power close cooled microwave needle probe concept which now entering final commercial system development. This design expects to achieve similar performance to the larger MTA open surgery device.
Microsulis' new microwave devices should result in many more potentially curative treatments being offered to patients in a large potential market constrained up till now by the technological limitations of current devices.
