High Intensity Focused Ultrasound Treatment of Prostate Cancer Pros & Cons
What is HIFU?
The HIFU technique is a minimally invasive technique that can be used to destroy tumors with heat and is most effective on small tumors. The procedure involves a focused ultrasound beam that causes mechanical vibrations to produce heat in the tissue. The temperature in the focal volume targeted intensifies and ablates the tumor by denaturing proteins and causing coagulative necrosis. HIFU is also notable because it does not require a needle like cryotherapy and radiotherapy ablation.
In this series David Beyer, MD and Erik Castle, MD debate the efficacy of HIFU treatment for prostate cancer.
David C. Beyer, MD, argues that there is enough research from randomized trials and clinical studies for the urological community to consider high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) as a standard of care for treating prostate cancer patients.
Erik P. Castle, MD, argues that using high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) to treat prostate cancer, as the technology stands today, results in too many negative quality of life outcomes for patients. Therefore, HIFU is not ready to be a standard of care in urological practices.