Image-Guided Interventions

							National Institutes of Health 



Fact Sheet 	                                          Image-Guided Interventions


Thirty Years Ago
For most of the history of medicine, physicians relied on     •	 In the past, most women who had uterine fibroids
their senses – primarily vision and touch – to diagnose          with symptoms required surgery to correct the
illness, monitor a patient’s condition, and perform              problem. Today, fibroid tumors can be non-
invasive procedures. During the last few decades various         invasively mapped and sized using MRI and then
three-dimensional medical imaging techniques, such as            treated with high-intensity focused ultrasound.
computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance
                                                              •	 MRI-guided cardiovascular interventions allow
imaging (MRI), and ultrasound, have become available
                                                                 doctors to view the coronary arteries in 3D,
that allow a physician to see and diagnose disease that is
                                                                 pinpointing the location of an obstruction and its
hidden from normal view.
                                                                 relationship to surrounding vessels.
Today                                                         •	 Ultrafast CT scanning can non-invasively predict
                                                                 heart attacks and other coronary diseases, even in
Three-dimensional biomedical images are now being                people without symptoms.
used not only for diagnosis, but for planning and
conducting treatment strategies and surgeries, a concept      •	 The quest for more accurate and effective
referred to as image-guided interventions.                       minimally-invasive surgical interventions resulted in
                                                                 the introduction of computer-assisted robotic
•	 A multidisciplinary team of researchers developed a           technology, whereby the surgeon works under image
   new computerized brain mapping technology that,               guidance with small tools through small incisions.
   when combined with image-guidance, greatly                    However, current instrumentation prohibits the
   improves the success rate of surgery to remove                surgeon from actually feeling the forces exerted
   seizure-causing brain regions in patients with                when manipulating tissue. To overcome this
   debilitating and untreatable epilepsy. This system            problem, researchers developed instruments with 3D
   re-defines the state-of-the-art for epilepsy surgery          touch sensors designed to give the surgeon a feeling
   specifically and neurosurgery in general.                     comparable to that of performing the task manually.
•	 MRI makes a profound difference in the detection of
   breast cancer, finding invasive cancers early when         Tomorrow
   they are very small and easier to treat. MRI is also
                                                              Advances in computer technology, coupled with an
   better at finding multiple sites of breast cancer in the
                                                              increase in the accuracy and sensitivity of imaging
   same breast.
                                                              technologies, will make it possible to seamlessly
•	 Optical-based cellular imaging can detect the cells of     integrate diagnosis and treatment. Future image-guided
   other cancers at the earliest stages of disease,           interventions will enable medical practitioners to detect
   enabling life-saving intervention.                         critical illnesses at their most curable stage – oftentimes
                                                              at the cellular level, before any symptoms or signs are
•	 Minimally-invasive, image-guided procedures                noticeable. The practice of medicine will shift from one
   replaced open surgical biopsies for bone and other         of disease detection and treatment to one of prediction
   tumors.                                                    and prevention in asymptomatic, at-risk populations.




National Institutes of Health                                                                    Image-Guided Interventions – 1
Updated September 2006