Alliance to Develop Thermography Catheter System

A thermography catheter system employing an array of sensors that can detect unstable plaques in coronary arteries is being developed by Thermocore Medical Systems (Ghent, Belgium) and Cambridge Consultants Limited (CCL, Cambridge, UK), the European technology center for Arthur D. Little.

The system maps the interior of arteries on the basis of temperature variations to identify the plaque that most often leads to heart attacks. Clinical data generated by an early version of the device showed greater thermal variations in heart attack patients and patients with unstable angina than in patients with normal coronary arteries. The developers say the new device will serve as a complement to an angiogram. They plan to have the catheter system ready for clinical trials in Europe within six to eight months

The catheter system could also be critically important to those patients who have already been treated for heart disease but who still have areas of unstable plaque that until now could not be identified. "These patients will be among the greatest beneficiaries of this technology because their dangerous unstable plaque has been previously overlooked and is a time bomb ticking away in their chest, waiting to explode,” said Dr. John Yianni, CEO of Thermocore.




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