Andre Abreu, MD, presented “HIFU Focal Therapy: Prostate Cancer – Emerging Data and Clinical Utility vs. Standard Care” virtually during the Virtual Global Summit on Precision Diagnosis and Treatment of Prostate Cancer on October 22nd, 2020.
How to cite: Abreu, Andre. “HIFU Focal Therapy: Prostate Cancer – Emerging Data and Clinical Utility vs. Standard Care” October 22nd, 2020. Accessed Dec 2024. https://dev.grandroundsinurology.com/hifu-focal-therapy-prostate-cancer-emerging-data-and-clinical-utility-vs-standard-care/
Summary:
Andre Abreu, MD, Urologist at the Keck Hospital of University of Southern California, describes how high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) works, and the data that earned it FDA-approval for prostatic tissue ablation in November 2015. Following this, Dr. Abreu reviews the three main goals of focal therapy: selectively ablating known disease, preserving functions, and minimizing morbidity, all without compromising life expectancy. He then uses two systematic reviews, one from 2017 and one from 2019, to explain how focal therapy benefits continence and potency rates. Further presented data includes a 2020 review of evidence and reported outcomes from an October 2020 study of hemigland HIFU ablation as primary treatment for localized prostate cancer, both of which exhibit HIFU’s safety, excellent potency, and continence preservation, as well as adequate short-term prostate cancer control. Dr. Abreu also addresses comparisons to radiation and acknowledges that HIFU works well for intermediate-disease but is still controversial for low- or high-risk disease, showing a need for further study.
The Virtual Global Summit on Precision Diagnosis and Treatment of Prostate Cancer brings together key international opinion leaders of every clinical subspecialty involved in patient care. This event is an integral part of the AdMeTech Foundation’s Annual Summit, which was established in 2016 and become seminal in shaping the state of the art and future vision for precision care. The goal of this event is three-fold: 1) Educating the key stakeholders; 2) Supporting a sustained cross-disciplinary dialogue and consensus on the best emerging clinical practices and research priorities; and 3) Expediting clinical adoption of promising novel diagnostics and therapeutics. Dr. Abreu presented this on the second day of the conference. For more educational activities from this virtual event, visit our collection page.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Andre Abreu is a urological surgeon and urologist, currently practicing at the Keck Hospital of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA. He earned his M.D. from the Universidade Federal do Ceará Faculdade de Medicina, where he also completed an internship. Dr. Abreu then completed his urology residency at the Hospital São Lucas da PUCRS in Brazil, followed by a fellowship in minimally-invasive surgery at the Keck Hospital of the University of Southern California. Current affiliations include Verdugo Hills Hospital, the Keck Hospital of USC, and USC Norris Cancer Hospital.
He is well-versed in both English and Portuguese and has contributed to several published works focusing on a variety of subjects, including analyses of robot-assisted surgery techniques, the utility and accuracy of MRI and ultrasound technology, and the limitations of computed tomography for renal tumors.
