Doctor’s Work in Ultrasound Images Aids Drug Industry

NY Times ^ | July 22, 2007 | STEPHANIE SAUL

[neverdem]

Dr. Steven E. Nissen’s most important medical contribution is his pioneering work in using ultrasound images to measure fatty plaque inside the walls of coronary arteries.

And so, his supporters say, pharmaceutical companies — whatever they may think of Dr. Nissen’s drug safety crusades — come to him to conduct industry-sponsored research on the heart effects of their medicines.

“He has technology that he’s good at that they need access to,” said Dr. Mehmet C. Oz, a well-known heart surgeon at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.

The technology — known as intravascular ultrasound, or IVUS — involves attaching miniature probes to the tip of a coronary catheter to create images of the inside of arteries. The information it reveals can help drug companies save money on clinical research by telling whether they are headed in the right direction with drugs under development.

“As a first step you do IVUS,” Dr. Oz said. “If you show no difference, you abandon ship.”

Dr. Nissen helped do research on the technology while working at the University of Kentucky Medical Center in Lexington. The research began in animals, but in 1990 he and colleagues made their first human pictures.

“It was the first time that anybody had ever seen coronary plaque up close and personal,” Dr. Nissen said.

[theBuckwheat]

For some strange reason, the NYT is not as chipper about showing pregnant women an ultrasound image of their unborn child.

coronary arteries, good, unborn babies bad.

Go figure.

[Westlander]

Reminds me of the ‘60s movie ‘Fantastic Voyage’.

[TXnMA]

IVUS = Cool Stuff!

I have a couple of stents; nice to know that they work so well. Next time I visit my cardiologist/"cathman", I'm going to ask him if he has an IVUS setup to check on whether my stents are still unobstructed... (And, no, I don't want him poking another hole in my femoral artery just to go take a look-see...)