Thursday, October 18, 2012

Transperineal biopsy with RMN-US fusion course at Guys Hospital London and Ginsburg study group meeting

This week I went to London, to participate in a course on transperineal prostatic biopsy organized by  Mr. Rick Popert at Guy's Hospital in London.


Very interesting, a move is taking place in the UK and Germany from the transrectal biopsy of the prostate for the diagnosis of prostate cancer (a simple procedure that can have serious infection complications) towards the transperineal biopsy, with a near zero risk of serious infection and allowing much better targeting based on MRI image fusion with Ultrasound and with a higher diagnostic yield.

The new 3 Tesla MRI is providing a much better diagnostic study of the prostate and there is now technology that allows to import the images from the MRI study into a special Ultrasound device, and the FUSION of both images allows to direct the biopsies to the suspect areas in the MRI. It allows to be sure that the suspect areas are properly targeted.


To me this approach seems totally logical and it improves diagnosis and reduces the risks. It is going to be extremely useful for those cases where we consider no treatment (active monitoring), to increase the diagnostic precision in cases with prior negative biopsies and to indicate which patients are suitable for focal treatments with cryosurgery and HIFU.


We have been doing transperineal biopsies for some time in Madrid, in patients with prior negative biopsies and we are happy to see that we were in the right track. Clinica CEMTRO has acquired a new 3 Tesla MRI that will be active soon, and I hope to be able to offer this type of transperineal biopsy targeted with MRI-US fusion to my patients very briefly.


The following day I participated at the meeting of the Ginsburg study group for transperineal biopsy with MRI-US fusion, and from now on I will contribute to the investigations of the group on this type of biopsy.


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