Cyroablation reduced pain from cancer that had spread to the bones, and pain relief was long lasting.
Patients with bone metastases in a Mayo Clinic study had severe pain that was not relieved with narcotics or other standard treatments. Treated with cryoablation, 80 percent reported significant reduction in pain, and even 6 months after treatment they were still having less pain. Their quality of life also improved.
Matthew Callstrom, M.D., Ph.D., a radiologist at Mayo Clinic, presented his findings on cryoablation for pain management at the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) annual meeting on November 27.
He used CT or ultrasound scans to place a small needle-like probes directly into bone tumors. Gas was circulated through the probes, and tumors were supercooled and turned to ice. The procedure shrinks or destroys bone metastases and provides long-term pain relief.
Dr. Callstrom pointed out
Cancer patients are living longer and we need to be able to manage their pain over a long period of time.
Bone metastases can be excruciatingly painful. Radiation therapy is currently the gold standard treatment for them, but pain relief after radiation may be short-lived. Cyroablation may provide another option for managing pain and improving quality of life.
Dr. Callstrom has recently received a grant from the National Cancer Institute that will fund a randomized clinical study comparing cyroablation to radiation therapy for bone metastases.
Leave a Reply
Your comments are welcome. However, specific medical advice will not be provided, and we urge you to consult with a qualified physician for diagnosis and for answers to your personal questions. FightCRC is not responsible for the medical accuracy of any comments left by persons other than FightCRC staff members. FightCRC staff members monitor comments and may respond publicly where appropriate.
Please note that we automatically publish the name that you enter next to your post. Also note that our pages are automatically indexed by Google and other search engines, and your name may therefore appear in search results on those sites. So if you wish to remain anonymous please use a different name or enter 'Anon' as the name.
We regret that we are unable to privately answer questions left as comments. So please do not include your phone number, email or mailing address in the body of your comment. For the best personal and direct response to your colorectal cancer treatment questions, please call our Answer Line at 1-877-4CRC-111 (1-877-427-2111).