Robotic-assisted surgery. Prostatectomies guided by ultrasound. Spinal surgery. Minimally invasive surgeries are replacing more traditional methods because they heal more quickly, require less hospital time and are usually not as painful. And, an international marketing research firm says, they’re happening mostly because of recent developments and improvements in imaging technologies. In Europe, they are what’s driving markets for interventional radiology and cardiology, according to writers at medimaging.com.
It’s a very big marketplace. Frost & Sullivan has reported that the “European interventional radiology market (including vascular and neurological applications) earned revenues of US$232.2 million in 2010.” But it will grow explosively in 2014, according to the research firm, to reach $296.2 million. And in Europe, the interventional cardiology (catheter-based treatment, according to Dr. Eric Cohen) market is estimated to grow from $284.3 million to approximately $404.6 million over the same period, according to Frost & Sullivan. This includes the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Scandinavia (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Finland) and Benelux (Belgium, The Netherlands, and Luxembourg). However, the current state of the European healthcare system may impede this growth.
“Key drivers for the interventional radiology market include an aging population and the rising demand for less expensive, outpatient-based procedures,” said Frost & Sullivan industry analyst Dr. Gideon Praveen Kumar, in the medimaging.net story. “The need for new installations in several catheterization laboratories, coupled with the replacement of existing C-arms having image intensifiers with flat panel detectors, will ensure revenue growth in the interventional cardiology markets.”
Frost & Sullivan predicts that the demand for minimally invasive surgeries “will be a major catalyst in the development of the interventional cardiology market.” This is because, they say, more patients prefer diagnostic and therapeutic procedures rather than invasive surgery, which are less painful and can be more free of complications. And since this can now be done with the same results as major surgery, in most cases, many patients prefer catheterization procedures.
Some of the advantages of minimally invasive interventional cardiology are less pain and risk of infection, smaller scars and shorter recovery times, according to Dr. Cohen at azdailysun.com. Patients are usually awake during the procedure, requiring only a local anesthetic, and sometimes even performed on “an outpatient basis, allowing patients to go home within hours of the procedure,” Dr. Cohen writes.
The original C-arms technology, which was what was used to scan images in Europe, is pretty much outdated, according to Frost & Sullivan. C-arms technology is used primarily for fluoroscopic imaging, which catches images that are moving quickly on a screen.
Most of the C-arms in Europe are “analogue-intensifying,” according to Frost & Sullivan. The new range of C-arms, however, use flat panel technology to capture better quality images with high resolution. The research firm predicts that, over the next two to four years, many hospitals in Europe will begin using this technology to achieve better imaging.
But what may hold back growth in the European marketplace, Frost & Sullivan reports, the healthcare industry is in crisis “because only a small fraction of the working population contributes financially to the industry.”
“Most interventional radiology equipment is high-end and therefore expensive,” Dr. Kumar told medimaging.net writers. “Due to government policies aimed at curbing escalating healthcare expenditure, healthcare institutes are finding it difficult to purchase and install additional interventional radiology equipment to meet patient demands.”
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Deborah DiSesa Hirsch is an award-winning health and technology writer who has worked for newspapers, magazines and IBM in her 20-year career. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by
Jennifer Russell
