Word: catheterizations
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There are other alternatives to the bypass. In the mid-1970s, Swiss Cardiologist Andreas Gruntzig developed an ingenious method of unclogging arteries using a small balloon. In angioplasty, now performed on about 12,000 patients a year, a narrow tube, or catheter, is threaded into the diseased artery until it...
Angioplasty works best on patients with only one blocked artery, but fails when the deposits are too hard to be compressed or cannot be reached with the catheter. For such cases another technique may soon be available. Taking his inspiration from the laser swords in Star Wars, Cardiologist Garrett Lee...
Once the catheter is in place, the laser is carefully aimed and fired at the obstruction. The lumps of fat "melt like butter," says Lee. The debris is swept up through a vacuum tube. The so-called laserscope has been tested on animals, and Lee hopes to begin trials involving...
The test, called chorionic villi sampling (CVS), is a painless procedure and can be done in a physician's office as early as the fifth week of pregnancy. To perform it, the obstetrician inserts a long thin tube through the vagina into the uterus. A second doctor, following the...
When the patient returns to the operating room, the surgeon removes the catheter and inserts the nephroscope. Optic fibers in the device provide a clear view of the quarry. The doctor then eases a tiny, basket-like grabbing device through the nephroscope and manipulates it to grasp and remove the...