Transcervical sterilization is a minimally invasive permanent birth control method that involves occluding—blocking or closing—a woman’s fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy. The procedure is an alternative to tubal ligation, or “getting your tubes tied.” Performed without incisions under...
Breast cancer among women is both common and deadly. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), not counting some kinds of skin cancer, breast cancer is the most common cancer in women of any race or ethnicity in the United States, and one of the most common causes of...
Laparoscopic surgery, also referred to as minimally invasive or keyhole surgery, is primarily used to examine the abdominal cavity and its contents in order to diagnose and treat health conditions associated with the gastrointestinal tract, gallbladder, appendix, liver, pancreas, spleen,...
Radial artery harvesting (RAH) is the process of removing the radial artery, located in the arm, for use as an arterial graft during coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG). During CABG, a healthy artery or vein is used as a graft to route the blood supply around the blocked coronary...
Exercise testing is used to identify and predict problems associated with the heart, blood vessels, and lungs. The procedure, often called “stress testing,” allows healthcare professionals to identify abnormalities that would not normally be present at rest. It may also be used to identify...
Vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is a treatment for epilepsy, a chronic neurological disorder that stems from disturbance of the brain’s nerve and that causes recurrent, unprovoked, and unpredictable seizures. The treatment involves implanting a device in the chest that sends electrical pulses to...
Intravascular brachytherapy (IVB) for coronary arteries is a radiation treatment to prevent restenosis, the re-clogging of arteries, following angioplasty and stent placement. Narrowed and blocked coronary arteries can be treated with balloon angioplasty, the surgical widening of a blocked...
Stereotactic radiosurgery is a noninvasive procedure that uses targeted radiation to treat tumors and abnormalities in the brain. The technique, developed in the 1950s as a less invasive alternative to brain surgery, does not require an incision and is generally performed on an outpatient basis...
Breast brachytherapy is a treatment for early-stage breast cancer. It is a form of accelerated partial breast irradiation (APBI), an alternative to standard radiation for preventing breast cancer recurrence after a lumpectomy. APBI can be delivered two ways: through external radiation beam...
Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) infuses a fecal suspension from a healthy donor into the gastrointestinal tract of a patient. This procedure is used to treat recurrent Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) infection and has shown promise in treating other conditions. C. difficile causes...
