On August 8, the research group of Professor Hiroaki Shimokawa of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Graduate School of Medicine, Tohoku University developed a completely new treatment method using shock waves in the field of ablation treatment for tachyarrhythmia, and conducted animal experiments. Announced that it reported its effectiveness and safety.
Tachyarrhythmia, a life-threatening disease, causes the pulse to become abnormally fast.Currently, the mainstream method is to use a high-frequency catheter (high-frequency ablation method), but there are various problems because heat is generated by high-frequency energization.
The research group has been working on the development of a catheter-based treatment method that uses shock waves instead of high frequencies as a treatment method that does not use heat, and this time, we have developed an "improved version of shock wave ablation method" that has been repeatedly improved.Safety was confirmed in animal experiments.
The improved shock wave ablation method reaches deeper than the conventional high frequency ablation method.The depth can also be adjusted.In addition, the damage to the inner part of the heart, which can cause thromboembolism, is extremely light.The improved shock wave ablation method is expected to be a more effective and safe option for the treatment of arrhythmia in the future.
Paper information: [EP Europace. 2017] Development of a novel shock wave catheter ablation system-A validation study in pigs in vivo-
