Medical Imaging Innovations on Tap at Medica 2011

The future of digestive tract diagnostics and imaging will one of many medical device technologies highlighted at the Medica 2011 trade fair, held in Düsseldorf, Germany from Nov. 16-19. According to show organizers, more than 4,500 exhibitors from 60 countries will be present.
Some of the technology featured at the event will include:

Magnets make travel through the stomach and intestines possible via capsule endoscopy. Patients who need an endoscopy now can swallow a small capsule containing two tiny cameras rather than the relatively thick endoscope. The capsule’s cameras provide clear images of the interior of the stomach and intestines. The technical advances made in have made it possible to move the capsule using magnetic force.

According to private lecturer Jutta Keller M.D., of the medical clinic at the Israeli Hospital in Hamburg, Germany, evidence of the sources of bleeding in the small intestine remains the most important indication for the method.

Hand-held magnets are simple and effective. The most advanced capsules are controlled by magnetic force. One option offers control by means of a hand-held magnet, such as the NEMO (nano-based capsule endoscopy with molecular imaging and optical biopsy), which was developed in a European research project. The system is based on a hand-held magnet developed by the Fraunhofer Institute in St. Ingbert, Gemany, and a modified capsule endoscope developed by Hamburg, Germany-headquartered Given Imaging Ltd. According to Dr. Keller, initial clinical trials were quite successful, and a targeted and comprehensive examination of specific structures was obtained in most subjects.

Electromagnetic maneuvering seems to be as reliable as conventional endoscopy. The MGCE (magnetically guided capsule endoscopy) system, jointly developed by Munich, Germany-based Siemens Healthcare and Tokyo, Japan-headquartered Olympus Medical Systems, also will make an appearance. The magnetic capsule has two cameras and a permanent magnet, and can be remotely navigated through the stomach with a joystick. It takes four pictures per second, which are transferred wirelessly to an image processing system for immediate viewing. More than 50 people were examined in the first study; 30 showed pathological changes in the stomach. Of those, 14 were discovered using the capsule as well as a conventional gastroscope, 10 with the capsule only, and six with the gastroscope only.

Siemens Healthcare has developed a stomach simulator, which simulates every possible capsule maneuver. The simulator reproduces the video image of the capsule and displays the same navigation information available to doctors doing a real examination.

According to Dr. Keller, the technical advances are “impressive” and promise that clinical capsule endoscopy examination of the stomach will be possible in the future. For this and, presumably, for examinations of the esophagus and the retroperitoneally fixed duodenum, the hand-held magnet system could be a “pragmatic, effective and inexpensive solution”. It appears to be less suitable for examination of intraperitoneal sections of the intestine because the one-sided magnetic field that is generated tends to move the mobile loops of the small intestine instead of maneuvering the capsule longitudinally.

The further technical development of capsule endoscopy is not limited to capsule navigation: battery power, visual range and image quality are still being developed further. One of the most important objectives for gastroenterologists remains at-home intestinal cancer screening.