Up-date. Article at www.wired.com
Making It Too Hot for Cancer
by Kristen Philipkoski
3:00 a.m. 19.Feb.99.PST
Some women at a high risk for breast cancer choose to have a mastectomy rather than face the possibility of developing the disease. A new technology could offer an alternative to this radical solution.
Celsion Corporation, based in Columbia, Maryland, developed a method of using focused heat to target microwaves that seek out and kill tumors and precancerous cells without damaging surrounding healthy tissue and skin.
The microwaves are attracted to the water found in tumors. Normal breast tissue is made up almost entirely of fatty tissue, which doesn't contain water, so the device actively seeks out and sterilizes only the cancerous cells.
"What Celsion is doing is using a technology with microwaves deep in the breast tissue to sterilize the tumor nodule," said Paul Stauffer, medical physicist in radiation oncology at the University of California at San Francisco School of Medicine. "The hope at this point is that this will prove to equal the results with lumpectomy and mastectomy or even do better."
Celsion's system received Food and Drug Administration clearance as an adjunct to radiation therapy in September 1997. Now, the company wants to prove that the system can handle tumors on its own.
Last year, preclinical studies at Massachusetts General Hospital of Boston and in England showed that the focused-heat technology can heat a tumor by as much as 78 degrees without damaging skin or surrounding healthy tissue. At this temperature, the system can kill an entire tumor and any cancer cells in its vicinity in between eight and 10 minutes.
"With this procedure, we will compress the breast, fix it in place, [and] as in a mammography, provide heat from both sides, use a very sophisticated design for the microwave to be focused at the tumor and nothing else," said Augustine Cheung, chief scientific officer and founder of Celsion. "There's no burning, no blistering."
Because the procedure is noninvasive, it could reduce the incidence of metastization, which sometimes occurs when surgeons use a scalpel or needles to eradicate a tumor.
"If you have a large clump of cells and you break some off, they could float around in the blood stream and lodge somewhere else in the body," Stauffer said. "Once they break loose, the body might be able to take care of it, but sometimes the body doesn't. The patient won't die from a tumor in the breast, only when it spreads to a critical organ, like the brain or lungs."
Celsion will perform clinical trials this spring along with Massachusetts General, Hammersmith Hospital in London, and JFK Hospital in Florida.
The technology could prove useful not only for breast tumors, but also for other types of cancer. Celsion will perform another clinical study with UCSF in the spring to determine the focused-heat technology's efficacy in treating benign prostatic hyperplasia.
"We can use heat to eliminate the swelling and improve urination rate. This whole technology platform is designed for the entire body," Cheung said.
Celsion also plans a clinical study with Duke University to develop a system for abdominal tumors such as those in ovarian, colorectal, and liver cancer.
Celsion expects its breast-cancer treatment system to be available by the end of next year.
Basildon Bond |
