The Neurological Devices Panel of the Medical Devices Advisory Committee to the FDA has given its backing to a new device that may help to kill cancer cells and break up brain tumors.
Patients want the FDA to give complete approval to the new device, called a NovoTTF(tumor treating fields)-100A, which they say seems to give them a better quality of life. The machine is non-invasive and produces alternating electrical fields produced by unique insulated electrodes which are put on the scalp of the head.
The device was made by Novocure Ltd, which operates out of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, as well as at a center in Haifa, Israel that is used for research. Researchers said they weren’t sure the device actually helps to prolong life, but said it was a safe procedure to use it. The device changes a cancer cell’s components making it so that it is unable to divide, and thus multiply.
The original purpose of the device was to use it during therapy after everything else had been done for patients that had been treated for a cancer called glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) in adults over the age of 21. GBM is a malignant brain cancer that is usually fatal within five years of being discovered.
Normally, it is treated by doctors removing the part of the tumor that can be operated on and then using radiation, chemotherapy and a drug called Avastin, which prevents blood veins from being able to provide nourishment for the growing tumor.
The group from the FDA voted 7 to 3 that the benefits of the device outweighed any risks, even though they admitted they weren’t sure that it actually stops the disease, but said that they all believed the device was safe.
source: healthaim
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