The use of ultrasound in the fight against cancer

A revolutionary new ultrasonic treatment for liver and kidney cancer offers a surgery-free procedure for patients in the UK.\nUltrasound is high frequency sound beyond the range of human hearing and has been employed in a variety of ways in the medical field including, in diagnostics to look inside the body and observe a growing foetus, in physiotherapy as a tool to aid the rejuvenation of muscles and pain control, and now, in the treatment of tumours.\nThrough research by Professor Tim Mason, Head of Sonochemistry at Coventry University alongside Chinese researchers at the Chongqing Medical University made possible by trials at Churchill hospital in Oxford the procedures are now a reality. The new discovery proves that a type of focused ultrasound can now be used to treat specific tumours.\nTim, who has been involved in sonochemistry research for the past 25 years, explains that the key to this new type of ultrasonic cancer treatment is the ability to focus low energy ultrasound beams to a small, high energy target in a tumour inside the body.