On Efficacy of Microwave Ablation in the Thermal Treatment of an Early-Stage Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Abstract

Microwave ablation at 2.45 GHz is gaining popularity as an alternative therapy to hepatic resection with a higher overall survival rate than external beam radiation therapy and proton beam therapy. It also offers better long-term recurrence-free overall survival when compared with radiofrequency ablation. To improve the design and optimization of microwave ablation procedures, numerical models can provide crucial information. A three-dimensional model of the antenna and targeted tissue without homogeneity assumptions are the most realistic representation of the physical problem. Due to complexity and computational resources consumption, most of the existing numerical studies are based on using two-dimensional axisymmetric models to emulate actual three-dimensional cancers and surrounding tissue, which is often far from reality. The main goal of this study is to develop a fully three-dimensional model of a multislot microwave antenna immersed into liver tissue affected by early-stage hepatocellular carcinoma. The geometry of the tumor is taken from the 3D-IRCADb-01 liver tumors database. Simulations were performed involving the temperature dependence of the blood perfusion, dielectric and thermal properties of both healthy and tumoral liver tissues. The water content changes during the ablation process are also included. The optimal values of the input power and the ablation time are determined to ensure complete treatment of the tumor with minimal damage to the healthy tissue. It was found that a multislot antenna is designed to create predictable, large, spherical zones of the ablation that are not influenced by varying tissue environments. The obtained results may be useful for determining optimal conditions necessary for microwave ablation to be as effective as possible for treating early-stage hepatocellular carcinoma, with minimized invasiveness and collateral damages.

An Analysis of Microwave Ablation Parameters for Treatment of Liver Tumors from the 3D-IRCADb-01 Database

“…The effect of internal water evaporation in the bioheat Equation (2) was included by replacing specific heat c with an effective value, as described in ref. [48]:…”

“…The primary goal of this study was to demonstrate that 3D simulation is an ideal technique for MWA planning adjusted for each patient. For this purpose, we used a full 3D model of the MWA developed and tested using the COMSOL Multiphysics simulation platform [ 48 , 49 , 50 ]. Simulations were performed for a compact 10-slot coaxial antenna operating at 2.45 GHz inserted into realistic models of two tumors labeled as 1.07 and 1.03 in the 3D-IRCADb-01 liver tumors database [ 51 ].…”

“…The parameters that characterize the liver tissue (healthy and tumoral) and the blood collected from the literature[48,56] and used in the numerical simulations.…”

Fat Quantification Imaging and Biophysical Modeling for Patient-Specific Forecasting of Microwave Ablation Therapy

“…Finally, the rate of ablation volume per thermal dose was tabulated and visualized as a function of fatty liver content. To our knowledge, while literature exists on varying parenchymal properties (Prakash, 2010;Faridi et al, 2020;Radjenović et al, 2021;Tucci et al, 2021), this work links clinically related fatty liver disease images to the generation of patient-specific dielectric and thermal properties within the context of an image-tophysical material model and reports the consequent changes in the ablation zone.…”

Liver Resection Using Saline-Linked Radiofrequency Technology in an Infant with Congenital Hepatoblastoma

“…In recent years, new instruments using different types of energy for the coagulation or sealing of vessels have been developed for liver bloodless transection. Among these new technologies, SLRT, as described in the literature for adults, permits good control of surgical blood loss without the PM, and was thus used in this case [4,17,18].…”