Nanoknife

[x-rays1]

Has anyone had Nanoknife treatment on distant Mets?

I would be very interested to hear how it went. I have tumours in the spine and ribs and I’m wondering if it’s a suitable treatment.

[Tall_Allen]

I've never heard of that. It would be a very intrusive procedure- several electrodes stuck in, and not sure if that much electric shock to the spine is a good thing. The patient has to have his heart stopped and put on a heart/lung machine during the procedure.

[x-rays1 in reply to Tall_Allen]

Thank you Tall_Allen for your reply. It doesn’t sound like a good option at all. In fact quite dangerous. I appreciate your very useful comments and will continue looking for other options. Thanks again.

[Schwah in reply to x-rays1]

SBRT radiation to your Mets is a much better option. Do Kishan at ucla is one of the best and has done it for me twice with zero side affects. I know TA thinks the world of Kishan too.

Schwah

[x-rays1 in reply to Schwah]

thank you Schwah. I should have mentioned that I live in Melbourne Australia

[cesanon in reply to x-rays1]

You can contact the device manufacturer and find out who has their units in Australia. Its a US company, but they clearly sell their units into the EU, so maybe Australia as well.

angiodynamics.com/product/n...

angiodynamics.com/contact/

Customer Service: [phone] (opt. 2)

Clinical Support for Physicians: [phone] (opt. 5)

Media Inquiries: [phone]

[Seasid in reply to x-rays1]

You can get SBRT in Australia. Where do you live? I live in Darlingurst, Sydney and I am considering SBRT at this moment.

[Concerned-wife in reply to x-rays1]

Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne is a known worldwide for Lutetium prostate cancer treatments

[cesanon in reply to Tall_Allen]

I think its basically electric cauterization. My understanding is that they have a real lot of control over it.

"heart stopped and put on a heart/lung machine during the procedure" if that is true, it sounds pretty darn dangerous.

The article I cite below makes it sound a whole lot safer:

"significantly reduces toxicity on vital anatomical structures surrounding the malignancy. Because of these properties, IRE might become a standard therapy for PCa, and further, a problem solver for advanced T4-cancers for which there are few other treatment options and/or only treatable with resulting permanent damage."

"The motivation to use IRE for the treatment of PCa was its promise of low invasiveness and toxicity, with the goal of preservation of vital anatomical structures surrounding the prostate, whose damage results in the urogenital functional deficits effected by surgery and radiation therapy."

The article also doesn't make any mention about "heart/lung machine"

It looks appealing and interesting to me. If it was available in my time, I might have considered it.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

[Tall_Allen in reply to cesanon]

Ask anyone who does it. A urologist who watched one described it to me. It's like electrocution - it stops the heart.

[cesces in reply to Tall_Allen]

Those docs just never do a good job of telling you the negatives.

That's what's good about this forum.

You can find out the negatives before hand instead of after.

[x-rays1 in reply to cesanon]

Thank you Cesanon for your response. I will continue to check it out.

[Rustyboat in reply to Tall_Allen]

I was the first one to have it done and Sloan-Kettering in New York results were not that great it wasn’t invasive but it didn’t work out that well for me thank you

[Tall_Allen in reply to Rustyboat]

Didn't you have full anesthesia? They have to stick at least 2 probes at a time into the prostate to get the current flowing.

[cesces in reply to Rustyboat]

Can you tell us more about the procedure?

How long ago. And tje negative aspects of it?

[Rustyboat in reply to cesces]

They insert needles into the tumor with x-ray placement usually four

[Seasid in reply to Rustyboat]

Maybe they could biopsy the tumor before killing it? (Just my idea)

[cesces in reply to Seasid]

Why would they not?

[Seasid in reply to cesces]

I don't know, but I am just wondering.

Biopsies are important.

[Seasid in reply to Seasid]

I really want to know the status of that possibility (to do the biopsy also?).

[cesanon]

1. "Doctors use a special medical device designed for the specific purpose of performing irreversible electroporation.

The device implements a direct current generator which emits short pulses of high voltage electric current through electrodes into the cell membrane.

The doctor inserts thin needles into the area, using ultrasound imaging to guide the placement of the needles. In nanoknife treatment, strong electric fields cause cells to die without exposing the tissue to radiation or heating it.[5] Most patients don’t feel anything at all during the procedure."

2. It's a thing. It works on other cancers. Probably works on prostate cancer.

The proper name for this is: Irreversible electroporation (IRE)

3. I had a relative doing early research on it for liver cancer at Northwestern University about 10 years ago. He is a chaired professor (forgot the name of the chair) in their Bioengineering Department. Has hundreds and hundreds of Peer reviewed published articles (maybe like 400-500).

4. Here is a clinical trial for prostate cancer: Efficacy and Safety Assessment of IRE of Localized Prostate Cancer.

clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show...

5. Prostate cancer treatment with Irreversible Electroporation (IRE): Safety, efficacy and clinical experience in 471 treatments:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

"Irreversible Electroporation (IRE) is a novel image-guided tissue ablation technology that induces cell death via very short but strong pulsed electric fields. IRE has been shown to have preserving properties towards vessels and nerves and the extracellular matrix. This makes IRE an ideal candidate to treat prostate cancer (PCa) where other treatment modalities frequently unselectively destroy surrounding structures inducing severe side effects like incontinence or impotence. We report the retrospective assessment of 471 IRE treatments in 429 patients of all grades and stages of PCa with 6-year maximum follow-up time."

6. I'm pretty certain it is a well accepted treatment for Liver Cancer. It might make a nice substitute for radiation treatment. You don't have to worry about secondary cancers down the line from the radiation.

But if you have metastasis, it will never be a substitute for global non-local treatment.

7. If you can get it at a major medical center, it would be worth looking into.

[cesanon]

It seems the authors of the article I cited below think its especially useful for T5 tumors.

I guess it can go in there, get the job done, without toxicity or damage to surrounding tissues.

[addicted2cycling in reply to cesanon]

I believe this to be the Original info dated in 2007 by -- Gary Onik 1, Paul Mikus, Boris Rubinsky

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/176...

[Seasid]

Could you please fill out your profile information if you have time.

[Hidden]

Systemic treatment is called for.., I opted by chemotherapy with Lupron/Eligard in 2004.... killed the metastatic lesions in my spine and micro-metastasis floating around in my vascular and lymphatic systems. Do which ever systemic treatment your MO recommends and you are comfortable with.

GD

[Charles4212]

I had a spot on femur. Ten treatments. Pain stopped after 3rd treatment. No difficulty

[dadzone43]

There are ten postings under the feature at the top of the page.