Medical instruments and techniques for treating pulmonary disorders
First Claim
1. A method of treating a disorder of a lung comprising:
- generating a flow of vapor;
introducing the flow of vapor into a targeted airway of the lung at a pressure sufficient to extend the flow of vapor to extremities of the targeted airway;
delivering thermal energy to the lung tissue via a vapor-to-liquid phase transition of the vapor; and
modifying the lung tissue to treat the disorder.
4 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A surgical instrument for delivering energy to lung tissue, for example to cause lung volume reduction. In one embodiment, an elongated catheter has a handle portion that includes an interior chamber that is supplied with a biocompatible liquid media under pressure. An energy source delivers energy to the media to cause a liquid-to-vapor phase change within the interior chamber and ejects a flow of vapor media from the working end of the catheter. The delivery of energy and the flow of vapor are controlled by a computer controller to cause a selected pressure and selected volume of vapor to propagate to the extremities of the airways. Contemporaneously, the vapor undergoes a vapor-to-liquid phase transition which delivers a large amount of energy to airway tissue. The thermal energy delivered is equivalent to the heat of vaporization of the fluid media, which shrinks and collapses the treated airways. The treated tissue is the maintained in a collapsed state by means of aspiration for a short interval to enhance tissue remodeling. Thereafter, the patient'"'"'s wound healing response causes fibrosis and further remodeling to cause permanent lung volume reduction.
-
Citations
27 Claims
-
1. A method of treating a disorder of a lung comprising:
-
generating a flow of vapor; introducing the flow of vapor into a targeted airway of the lung at a pressure sufficient to extend the flow of vapor to extremities of the targeted airway; delivering thermal energy to the lung tissue via a vapor-to-liquid phase transition of the vapor; and modifying the lung tissue to treat the disorder. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21)
-
-
22. A method of treating a disorder of a lung comprising:
-
generating a flow of vapor; expanding an expansion structure in a proximal portion of a targeted airway to occlude the airway; introducing the flow of vapor into the lung distal to the expansion structure; delivering thermal energy to the lung tissue via a vapor-to-liquid phase transition of the vapor; and modifying the lung tissue to treat the disorder. - View Dependent Claims (23, 24, 25, 26, 27)
-
Specification