Microwave Producing Hand-held Scanner Designed to Detect Cancer

[John_Sukosky@DOM.COM]

Wednesday June 11, 11:45 PM

http://in.news.yahoo.com/030611/137/251nr.html





Hand-held scanner designed to detect cancer





LONDON (Reuters) - Italian scientists have developed and are testing a

hand-held scanner, similar to metal detectors used in airports, to diagnose

cancerous tumours. In clinical trials of the device called Trimprobe, the

scanner pinpointed 93 percent of prostate cancer tumours that were later

confirmed by biopsies.  "The development holds out the prospect of a

mass-screening technology that is cheap, quick and non-invasive," New

Scientist magazine said on Wednesday.  The white plastic baton, which was

developed by physicist Clarbruno Vedruccio of the University of Bologna and

the Italian aerospace firm Galileo Avionica, is passed over the body. There

is no need to undress. The scanner contains an antenna that produces a beam

of microwaves that vary in frequency from 400 to 1350 megahertz. According

to Vedruccio and his team, tumours generate strong interference at about

400 megahertz.  A computer details the amount of interference at different

frequencies.  Carlo Bellorofonte, a urologist who tested the scanner on

prostate patients at the San Carlo Borromeo Hospital in Milan, described

the results as amazing.  "The scanner seems ideal for mass-screening of

cancer because it is rapid, non-invasive and highly sensitive," he told the

magazine. In a separate trial of breast cancer patients at the European

Institute of Oncology in Milan the scanner detected breast cancer in 66

percent of cases.  Further tests are being conducted on patients with lung,

stomach, liver and colorectal cancer. "However, the results of the early

trials have yet to appear in a peer-reviewed medical journal and must be

regarded with caution until then," the magazine added.







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