Integrated ultrasound imaging and ablation probe

Abstract

A system for imaging and providing therapy to one or more regions of interest is presented. The system includes an imaging and therapy catheter configured to image an anatomical region to facilitate assessing need for therapy in one or more regions within the anatomical region and delivering therapy to the one or more regions of interest within the anatomical region. In addition, the system includes a medical imaging system operationally coupled to the catheter and having a display area and a user interface area, wherein the medical imaging system is configured to facilitate defining a therapy pathway to facilitate delivering therapy to the one or more regions of interest.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION[0001]The present invention is a continuation of and claims priority to U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11 / 276,259, filed Feb. 21, 2006, which claims the benefit of provisional application U.S. Ser. No. 60 / 739,800, filed Nov. 23, 2005.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]The invention relates generally to diagnostic imaging, and more particularly, to an ablation array having independently activated ablation elements. The invention is further related to control of such an ablation array to ablate multiple ablation points simultaneously, create a linear or curvilinear ablation lesion, or ablate multiple ablation points at a given catheter position.[0003]Heart rhythm problems or cardiac arrhythmias are a major cause of mortality and morbidity. Atrial fibrillation is one of the most common sustained cardiac arrhythmias encountered in clinical practice. Cardiac electrophysiology has evolved into a clinical tool to diagnose and treat these cardiac arrhyt...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

Heart rhythm problems or cardiac arrhythmias are a major cause of mortality and morbidity.

A drawback of these techniques however is that these procedures are extremely tedious requiring considerable manpower, time and expense.

Further, the long procedure times associated with the currently available catheter-based ablation techniques increase the risks associated with long term exposure to ionizing radiation to the patient as well as medical personnel.

Additionally, with RF ablation, the tip of the catheter is disadvantageously required to be in direct contact with each of the regions of the anatomy to be ablated.

However, fluoroscopic techniques disadvantageously suffer from drawbacks, such as difficulty in visualizing soft tissues, which may result in a less precise definition of a therapy pathway.

Consequently, these RF ablation techniques typically result in greater collateral damage to tissue surrounding the ablation sites.

However, these systems disadvantageously provide only static images and are inherently unfavorable for imaging dynamic structures such as the heart.

Another issue frustrating intravenous and intra-arterial ablation is the non-integration between ultrasonic imaging arrays and ablation arrays, each of which are positioned in a body via separate catheters.

Understandably, this can be difficult and time-consuming.

Second, conventional ablation techniques utilize RF ablation catheters, which, as described above, require the physician to physically contact each desired ablation point.

As a typical ICE procedure will include 100-200 ablation points, the ablation process can become quite tedious and lengthy.

In addition to ICE, the same or similar drawbacks are also experienced in transesophageal echocardiography (TEE), laparoscopy, arthroscopy, and other procedures characterized by a disintegration of imaging and ablation devices.

Since most ablation procedures involve approximately 100-200 ablation points, one-at-time ablation can be quite time consuming and tedious.

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