This Tiny Chip Will Help Doctors Unclog Your Arteries

In a day and age where more people are killed by heart disease than most anything else, it would make sense that doctors and researchers would spend a majority of their time trying to figure out how to change that statistic. And, in a day and age like today, it’s not at all surprising that they’ve found a way to use advanced technology to help solve one of the biggest health problems of our time.

Some researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have been hard at work developing a tool that will allow doctors and surgeons to see things in and around the human heart that they’ve not been able to see clearly until now. It’s a tiny catheter-based silicon chip that only measures 1.4 millimeters, but it is able to take fully 3D pictures of the heart, as well as all of the arteries and the blood vessels that surround the heart. And, it includes some of the technology already found in cell phone cameras, which isn’t hard to believe, but is surprising nonetheless. Many believe that this little chip will have a big impact on how heart disease and clogged arteries are combated.

Something So Small Could Have Such A Big Impact

You might be thinking that doctors could already see images from inside of the heart, and you would be right. The only problem with the images were they were cross-sectional, and they didn’t allow them the ability to see a complete image of everything that was going on. Now, using volumetric imaging, they will be able to see what they were semi-blind to before.

If this chip proves successful (and it sounds as if it will), surgeons are very hopeful that it will reduce the amount of surgeries that are needed to unclog arteries. Less surgery is always a good thing.

What do you think?

[Image via DigitalJournal]

SOURCE: http://mobile.theverge.com/2014/2/21/5434730/catheter-CMOS-sensor-could-help-doctors-clear-arteries