Fiber Optic Laser

Reported August 2005

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (Ivanhoe Broadcast News) -- New technology is clearing the way for easier, safer and less-expensive surgeries for some patients.

Just a few months ago, this laser procedure to remove growths from Joyce Douglas's airway was much more dangerous than it is today. That's because it had to be done in an operating room with general anesthesia.

Now, fiber-optic technology is making it possible for the treatment to be done right in the doctor's office with Douglas wide awake.

"We're getting better results, at less cost, without an anesthetic here in the office," says otolaryngologist Jamie Koufman, M.D., who is director of The Center for Voice and Swallowing Disorders and Professor of Otolaryngology at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem N.C.

Dr. Koufman is pioneering the procedure. She uses two different lasers. First, a carbon-dioxide laser is threaded up the patient's nose inside this tiny optical fiber. This laser removes the growth. Then a pulsed-dye laser helps prevent new growths from forming. Guiding the whole procedure is a high-resolution fiber-optic camera on the tip of the scope.

"We have the ability to go down into the lung and go between the vocal folds to places that are very difficult to get at -- even in the operating room," Dr. Koufman tells Ivanhoe.

For Douglas, the new treatment is a godsend. Her recurrent growths obstructed her breathing for more than 35 years. She says, "My breathing, I feel like, is a lot better with the new laser that they're using," an improvement she can feel with each and every breath she takes.

The same approach will work for more than 50 percent of all surgeries to remove vocal nodules, polyps and cysts. The pulsed-dye laser is already FDA approved, and the FDA is expected to approve the carbon-dioxide laser as early as this fall.

Click here to Go Inside This Science or contact:

Optical Society of America
2010 Massachusetts Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20036.1023
(202) 223-8130
(202) 223-1096 fax
info@osa.org
http://osa.org/



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