The Early Effects of MRgFUS in Treating Uterine Fibroids

摘要

MRgFUS (Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound Surgery, ExAblate2000TM, InSightec) system creates thermal coagulation regions inside the fibroids in treating symptomatic uterine fibroids. The authors have treated 89 fibroids on 58 patients for 16 months starting from June 2004. We classified the fibroids into 3 types in accordance with T2-weighted MR images for evaluating the effect of treatment to the modality of fibroids. They are: type 1: very low intensity as skeletal muscle; type 2: low intensity compared with uterine muscle but high with skeletal muscle; type 3: high or equal intensity compared with uterine muscle. The volumes of fibroid and the treated region were evaluated from MR images. The treated volume was calculated from the non-perfusion area of meglumine gadoterate immediately after the treatments. The results show that type 1 and type 2 fibroids are suitable application of MRgFUS. On the other hand, type 3 fibroid is difficult application of MRgFUS treatment, for the treated ratio was smaller than the other types.