The Detroit News reports that Dearborn’s Oakwood Hospital is one of few hospitals in the country to perform a procedure, called CLiRpath, for treatment of peripheral vascular disease.
According to Spectranetics, the manufacturer of the laser system, the device has been FDA approved. Furthermore:
Current alternatives to treat refractory total occlusions common in advanced arterial disease are limited, and “treatment” often is amputation. With a 95% limb salvage rate* among survivors, the new CLiRpath system gives your CLI patients with total occlusions not crossable by a guidewire, a viable alternative in the fight against amputation. Used in conjunction with the CVX-300® laser system, CLiRpath Extreme® Catheters use “cool” ultraviolet excimer laser energy to cross total obstructions and restore straightline blood flow to the foot, which may facilitate wound healing.
The CVX-300 excimer laser is a pulsed system that vaporizes plaque and thrombus by delivering very high energy in extremely short pulses. The “cool” excimer laser ablates tissue on contact (about 50 microns from the catheter’s tip) without inducing thermal damage to the treated artery.
Debulking with CLiRpath prior to balloon angioplasty transforms total occlusions not crossable by a guidewire and diffuse multilevel disease into more easily ballooned stenoses.
Great system, indeed. One of the most common methods to unblock thrombosed artery nowadays is to use a so-called Fogarty catheter (wire with an inflatable balloon at the tip), to surgically bypass the obstruction, or to amputate. One does not have to be a doctor to realize how sucky these options are.
More at Spectranetics…