As healthcare systems around the world are facing rising patient volumes and increasing cost pressures, the number and complexity of image-guided therapy procedures is growing.
Image-guided therapies, also known as minimally invasive therapies or interventions, are usually performed by delivering a local treatment via catheters, navigated through a small opening in the blood vessels, or needles through the skin. Medical imaging technologies involving X-rays, ultrasound, CT and MRI are used to enable and guide these procedures.
The images produced provide the visual maps that allow the clinician to guide these instruments through the body to perform the therapy.
The ongoing growth of image-guided therapy procedures is being driven by the significant benefits it offers healthcare systems and patients.
Those benefits include:
• Enhanced procedural outcome[2]
• Reduced patient risk[2]
• Shorter recovery times and hospital stays[2]
• Lower health system costs[2]