Ischemic strokes can cause havoc in the brain, but early and properly directed treatment can mitigate a lot of damage. While there are a number of options to unclog blocked arteries, the potential to provide additional drug therapy remains mostly unexplored because of the difficulty in getting medications past the blood-brain barrier. Now, researchers at […]
Tag: Neurosurgery
Coaxial Electrospinning Creates Novel Contraceptive, Other Medical Devices
Electrospinning is a manufacturing technique that has recently been getting a lot of attention in medicine because it allows researchers to produce novel materials and devices. Essentially, a polymer is melted and squeezed through a nozzle and an electric field is used to pull and spin it into a mesh of very fine fiber. The […]
ClaroNav’s Navient Cranial Navigation System Cleared in Europe
ClaroNav Kolahi , a company based in Toronto, Canada, won European regulatory approval for its Navient Cranial navigation system, a product designed to make neurosurgical navigation easy, intuitive, and space-efficient in the OR. Navient Cranial can be used in open or percutaneous procedures to help locate surgical targets within the brain and wherever stereotactic neurosurgery […]
NICO Myriad NOVUS Provides Xenon Lighting for Brain Resections
NICO Corporation, a company based in Indianapolis, Indiana, is releasing its new NICO Myriad NOVUS resection tool. The FDA cleared product combines xenon illumination with NICO’s proven myriad neural tissue removal technology. Xenon lights reproduce the visible spectrum of daylight much better than most other bulbs, although LED contenders are now available, and so are […]
World First: Man Controls Two Powered Prosthetic Arms with His Mind
There has been a lot of progress over the past few years in the field of brain-computer interfaces, a technology that may give severely paralyzed people the ability to use robotic arms and legs. As anyone with two arms knows, one is not enough for many tasks. So researchers at Johns Hopkins University have successfully […]
Soft Auditory Brainstem Hearing Implants from Platinum Kirigami
People who have hearing loss because of inner ear damage or from a poorly functioning auditory nerve are not helped by cochlear and middle ear implants. Auditory brainstem implants (ABI), which bypass most of the hearing system and send signals directly to the auditory brainstem, are the best option for such patients. But currently these […]
Alvo Medical Shows Off Its Vision of The Future of Operating Room Design
Located in the picturesque town of Śmigiel, Poland, Alvo Medical is a family-run business that specializes in everything related to operating room layout and design. Since the company first started producing steel operating room furniture 25 years ago, Alvo has grown to become a worldwide provider of innovative healthcare solutions in the OR. During our […]
Peptide Particles Ferry Drugs Across Blood-Brain Barrier
Most drugs, genetic materials, and other therapeutic agents are very difficult to use inside the brain because of the blood-brain barrier. There have been attempts to use ultrasound and microbubbles to create temporary passages through the barrier, including as a possible therapy for Alzheimer’s disease, but this is approach is not easy or ideal. Now, […]
Medtronic’s Tiny New InterStim Micro Neurostimulator Submitted to FDA
Medtronic has filed for FDA approval for its InterStim Micro neurostimulator and the accompanying InterStim SureScan MRI leads. The rechargeable device delivers sacral neuromodulation therapy to treat conditions such as overactive bladder, fecal incontinence, unobstructed urinary retention, and urinary urge incontinence. Along with the InterStim Micro, the new leads allow patients with the implanted system […]
3D Microenvironments to Grow Brain Tumors in Lab
Clinical researchers are constantly thwarted by the inability to quickly and easily try new therapies in tumors and other disease targets. Tumors within the brain are particularly hard to study because of the difficulty with access and the incredible fragility of nearby tissues. Researchers at Tufts University have just developed a way to create an […]
Exoskeleton Walks to Brain’s Commands
Powered exoskeletons are used to help people with lower limb paralysis get on their feet and allow post-stroke patients to recover faster. They’re pretty impressive devices, but people who are severely disabled, including those suffering from tetraplegia, can’t get much benefit from them. Now, a team of researchers in France has succeeded in getting a […]
Laser Activated Gold Nanorods Create Silk Seal for Incisions and Wounds
Staples and sutures are currently used to seal soft tissues together in clinical practice, but researchers at Arizona State University have come up with an alternative technique that resembles welding. It may end up being used to seal tissues during surgeries and to treat wounds, and in many cases simply to enhance the effectiveness of […]
New Imaging Technique Reveals Deep Tumors, Helps Attack Them
Tumors deep inside the body can be very difficult to spot, track, and study. The brain, being surrounded by a thick skull, is particularly challenging to image using light, so MRI and CT are currently the go-to imaging modalities when looking at deeply seated tissues. Now, researchers at Stanford University are reporting the development of […]
Hyperspectral Surgical Microscope to See Cancer Cells in Real Time
Since internal cancerous tumors usually look exactly like the healthy tissues around them, frozen section analysis is used during and after surgeries to confirm that the entirety of a tumor has been removed. This is a slow process that often leads to patients requiring follow-up procedures. Researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas have […]
Synchron Announces First Successful Clinical Implantation of Stentrode
Synchron, a spin-off from the University of Melbourne in Australia, has announced the first successful implantation of the Stentrode minimally invasive neural interface device in a person. The device is part of the Synchron brain-computer interface and combines the minimally invasive delivery of a vascular stent with the functionality of a neural implant. The company […]
Abbott Proclaim XR 10-Year Spinal Cord Stimulator FDA Approved for Chronic Pain
Abbott won approval for and is releasing a new spinal cord stimulator that can treat chronic pain for up to ten years without requiring a recharge. The Proclaim XR delivers a low dose version of Abbott’s unique BurstDR waveform, which supposedly delivers a signal similar to the brain’s own patterns. Instead of overdriving the pain […]
Nanoelectrode Chip to Study Neuronal Network Activity of Thousands of Cells
Though the patch clamp electrode allowed neuroscientists to study electrical signals from inside neural cells, it is a tool with very limited capabilities. No more than about a dozen cells at a time can be studied, but the brain and the neural system operate on much larger scales. To help study entire neuronal networks comprising […]
Galen Microsurgery System Eliminates Hand Tremor
Galen Robotics, a company based in Baltimore, Maryland, has been working on incorporating robotics and microsurgery. Microsurgery requires a steady hand and a great deal of patience, something that robots can be pretty good at. By creating an innovative interface between the surgeon’s hands and a specially designed robot, Galen’s technology can eliminate hand tremor […]
FDA Clears Siemens Artis icono Angiography Systems
Siemens Healthineers won FDA clearance for the ARTIS icono angiography systems that are designed for use in a variety of procedure types. The ARTIS icono 2D/3D biplane system is intended for neuroradiology and abdominal imaging while the ARTIS icono floor has a single fluoroscope and is designed for vascular, interventional cardiology, surgical, and oncology procedures. […]
Injectable Hydrogel for Transcatheter Intravascular Embolization: Interview with Dr. Rahmi Oklu, Founder of Obsidio
Obsidio Inc., a medical device company based in Columbia, South Carolina, has developed an embolic hydrogel (called a gel embolic material: GEM) designed to be delivered minimally invasively through a clinical catheter for blood vessel occlusion. Applications include controlling blood flow in vascular injuries and aneurysms, reducing tumor blood supply, and preventing abnormal blood flow […]