U.S researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Rochesteter, Minn. found that freezing tumors helped relieve the extreme pain associated with cancer that has spread to the bone.
Cryoablation, the freezing process, is used to destroy kidney, prostate and other 
tumors, however, researchers found that it also eased the pain of cancer patients. The small study found that 80 percent of patients experiences significant pain reduction and that the effect lasted upto to six months. 34 patients who had been unable to get relief from conventional pain therapies were involved in the study. All had different primary cancers, including renal cell, ovarian, colorectal, thyroid and melanoma and all had cancer which had spread to the bone. Doctors used CT imaging scanners to guide needle-like probes to the tumor where argon gas was injected through a tube into a larger chamber in the probe causing it to become cold enough to freeze the tumor. Patients started the study with an average pain score of 7.2 out of 10 and by week 8 of the study pain levels had reduced to 3.6 and at the 24 week mark pain was reported to have dropped to an average of 1.7.
"Two key parts of this study are that the reduction in pain lasts and their quality of life improves after receiving the treatment," Dr. Matthew Callstrom, a radiologist, said in a statement. He presented his results at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America in Chicago. "That's a pretty good drop in their pain," said Callstrom, who was not paid by Endocare. "The technique is very well tolerated. It does not increase pain and you can do it with very high precision."
Endocare Inc, a medical device manufacturer, funded the Mayo Clinic study.
[Source: Yahoo News]
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