Focused ultrasound tumour ablation in small animal oncology.

The cancer incidence rates for humans and animals remain high, and efforts to improve cancer treatment are crucial. Cancer treatment for solid tumours includes both treatment of the primary tumour and of metastasis. Surgery is commonly employed to resect primary and metastatic tumours, but is invasive, and is not always the optimal treatment modality. Prevention and treatment of metastatic disease often utilizes a multimodal approach, but metastasis remains a major cause of death for both human and veterinary cancer patients. Focused ultrasound (FUS) tumour ablation techniques represent a novel non-invasive approach to treating cancer. FUS ablation is precise, thus sparing adjacent critical structures while ablating the tumour. FUS ablation can occur in a thermal or non-thermal fashion. Thermal FUS ablation, also known as high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) ablation, destroys tumour cells via heat, whereas non-thermal FUS, known as histotripsy, ablates tumour cells via mechanical disintegration of tissue. Not only can HIFU and histotripsy ablate tumours, they also demonstrate potential to upregulate the host immune system towards an anti-tumour response. The aim of this report is provide a description of HIFU and histotripsy tumour ablation, with a focus on the basic principles of their ablation mechanisms and their clinical applicability in the field of veterinary oncology.

Treatment of solid tumors in dogs using veterinary high-intensity focused ultrasound: A retrospective clinical study.

High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is a cancer treatment tool that focuses ultrasound energy on tumor tissues, which initiates necrosis via heat and mechanical effects. The efficacy of veterinary HIFU (vHIFU) was evaluated for the treatment of solid tumors in dogs. Data from 11 client-owned dogs with various solid tumors treated by vHIFU between 2013 and 2017 were retrospectively evaluated. Ten of the 11 dogs were followed up; clinical signs were alleviated in five. Four dogs exhibited a decrease in tumor size, and bleeding stopped in all four dogs with hemorrhagic tumors. Side effects included hyperthermia or erythema on the application site, enteritis, and skin ulcerations. These results suggest that vHIFU could be used as an alternative cancer treatment for dogs with solid tumors.