How Does Laser Treatment Work?
With the age of technology, the increasing use of artificial intelligence and minimally invasive interventions, the devices and methods we use in medicine are improving day by day. Laser Ablation treatment, whose use has started to increase recently in the digestive system, is one of them. The first person to mention laser was Albert Einstein in 1917. Later, Maiman used the laser in dermatology in 1960. Laser; It is based on the principle that light is transmitted by the energy given to the atom, photons are emitted from the atom, optically combined between the two layers and passed through a fiber.
It performs cutting, coagulation and ablation with thermal damage to the tissue with laser light, and it does this by eliminating the tissue with its evaporation feature. Tissue healing is better as it eliminates the tissue and replaces it with regeneration.
Laser Treatment and Digestive System Diseases
Many other systems use laser effectively in Urology, Dermatology, ENT and Ophthalmology. In gastroenterology, we used to use a different version of the laser with an argon gas pump only for cautery purposes in vascular lesions, but the light laser system has recently come into use.
Laser ablation treatment in gastroenterology is very successful and effective, especially in the treatment of digestive system strictures. Its advantage over other treatments is that the chance of success is high, the complication rate is almost non-existent and the probability of recurrence of the disease is low.
Digestive system stenosis may be due to many reasons; Esophageal stenosis due to complications of radiation therapy, esophageal stenosis as a result of accidental or suicidal ingestion of flammable substances such as caustic substances (detergent, etc.), esophageal stenosis due to eosinophilic esophagitis, esophageal stenosis due to reflux, ESD (Endoscopic Submucosal Dissection) in the esophagus. Esophageal stenosis after early stage tumor removal… Laser ablation treatment can be safely applied in the treatment of these stenosis.
Another area of use of the Holmium laser is to break large stones in the bile ducts (with the lithotripsy technique).
It is also used for palliative treatment in advanced stage tumors, especially in cases that narrow the lumen, and for local treatment of the tumor. Another area of use is that we can perform the method we call ESD with laser, which we do by entering the mouth or anus with endoscopes in early stage cancers in the digestive system.
Laser Ablation Treatment Procedure
The patient is prepared for the procedure, such as an upper digestive system endoscopy. The medications that he will not take before the procedure are told three days in advance, and the patient is planned to come to the hospital fasting for at least 8 hours. The procedure is performed under anesthesia, by passing a laser catheter through the treatment channel of an endoscope advanced through the mouth and treating the tissue with laser. Depending on the patient’s underlying disease, the patient is discharged after 5-6 hours of observation on the day of the procedure, or the next day after an overnight hospital stay and follow-up.
