The Shockwave device helps break up coronary artery calcium. (Photo courtesy Bon Secours)
With medicine, as with most things in life, better tools may mean better outcomes.
Two high-tech tweaks recently introduced in metro Richmond health care systems illustrate that point.
One is an artificial intelligence enhancement to a colonoscopy, the other is a tool that blasts calcium deposits in coronary arteries with sonic pressure waves.
The colonoscopy add-on is called GI Genius, which is in use at the Central Virginia VA Health Care System. The AI tool can help endoscopists conducting the procedure to identify potentially problematic polyps that they would not ordinarily be able to see.
It was cleared by federal officials for use in April. It’s been in use since June at McGuire VA Medical Center, and “we have had a very good experience with the tool,” says Dr. Michael Fuchs, chief of gastroenterology and hepatology with the VA Health Care System and a professor of medicine with the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine.
Colon cancer is one of the three leading causes of cancer deaths in veterans. The local VA performs about 2,500 colonoscopies each year.
Fuchs says the population that the VA works with has about a 20% higher rate of colon cancer than the private sector. Fuchs notes that most veterans are male, and in comparison with the general population, they skew older and tend to have more comorbidities and take more medications.
The device has been shown to increase detection of precancerous lesions by 30%. Contained in a small box and attached to an endoscope, it analyzes the images from the procedure and compares the images with those in its database. If the device detects what it deems to be a cancerous polyp or one that could grow into one, it emits a sound and projects a green box onto the problematic area. The doctor can then examine the area.
“It still requires a human being to judge what the machine is showing you,” Fuchs says.
As use of the device expands, so, too, will its database, which will improve its accuracy. Fuchs says that at some point, AI will reach a stage where it can identify polyps and also give pathology reports, telling the doctor which polyps need removal and which do not.
Heart Helper
At three Bon Secours facilities in metro Richmond, cardiologists have a new tool, a Shockwave IVL System with a Shockwave C2 Coronary IVL catheter, to clear coronary artery calcium deposits in some patients with advanced heart disease. Such blockages are usually cleared with a stent or in a balloon procedure, but some patients with more severe heart disease may attain better results with intravascular lithotripsy, which uses sound to clear the arteries, similar to the lithotripsy procedures used to clear kidney stones. The procedure helps prep the artery for stenting.
Lithotripsy procedure candidates include people who have had previous bypass surgeries or those who are older or with an underlying condition such as kidney disease, according to Dr. Manu Kaushik, an interventional cardiologist at St. Mary’s.
The device was approved for use in the heart in April; it had previously been approved to clear blocked arteries in legs and groins. It is available at St. Mary’s Hospital, Memorial Regional Medical Center in Mechanicsville and St. Francis Medical Center in Midlothian.
CAPSULES
Health and medicine news in brief
- Kids have questions concerning COVID-19 that parents can’t always answer. Children will have a chance to learn about the novel coronavirus from two experts, Virginia’s COVID-19 Vaccine Czar, Danny Avula, and neuroscientist Catherine Franssen in a virtual Q&A session at noon on Thursday, Oct. 14, presented by the Science Museum of Virginia. Register by 10:30 a.m. the day of the event. Your kids can submit their questions after they register. Free; limited to the first 1,000.
- COVID-19 positivity rates are trending in the right direction in Virginia, with a seven-day positivity rate at 8.2%. Through Sept. 25, the rate of infection in unvaccinated Virginians was 635.4 per 100,000, and 7.7 per 100,000 in the fully vaccinated.
- COVID-19 long-haulers may benefit from Twin 360, a study in the works at Virginia Commonwealth University that will look at the novel coronavirus in twins. Researchers will look at the interplay of genetic and environmental factors as they seek to learn why some people may recover relatively quickly from COVID while others may have to contend with the virus’s aftermath for months. Participants will be recruited from a database of twins who have signed up to participate in research through the university’s Mid-Atlantic Twin Registry. Twins who are interested in Twin 360 may sign up for the registry here.
- VCU is also tracking smell and taste loss in people with COVID-19 ages 18 and older. Survey results indicate that younger adults, under 40, are more likely to regain taste and smell than older adults, according to an Oct. 5 release. The study is in The American Journal of Otolaryngology.
