alt Hacker NewsWhat are the chances that breaking up a tumor this way seeds cancer elsewhere in the body? 2024 meta analysis of seeding I didn't see ultrasound in there: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39605885/
Here is a study on AEs specifically from this type of ultrasound: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
Quote: "Cavitation detaches cancer cells/emboli from the primary site and thereby releases them into the circulation, leading to metastasis"
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Chemo post-histrophy would remove any lingering cancer cells effectively. Cancer cells need lots of fuel or they stop replicating, and this is what traditional chemo is great at stopping.
> What are the chances that breaking up a tumor this way seeds cancer elsewhere in the body?
that's discussed in the article
It seems they are initially focused on pancreatic cancer, which has a very low survival rate ~14% [1].
In theory, this may mean that metastisizing this tumour could destroy it in the pancreas, but allow the cells to spread to more treatable locations?
1 - https://www.canceraustralia.gov.au/cancer-types/pancreatic-c...
It would not be the first therapy that may promote spread while curing the primary site. Hopefully there are measures to assess the cost / benefits.
> The mechanical destruction of tumors likely leaves behind recognizable traces of cancer proteins that help the immune system learn to identify and destroy similar cells elsewhere in the body, explains Wood
Seems a little too speculatively worded, IMO.
We simply won’t know until they do the inevitable phase2/3 RCTs. They will need to show that this method helps people survive longer or with better quality of life than the current standard of care.