Impact of Heat Transfer Coefficient on Tumor Ablation
Author Information
Author(s): Icaro dos Santos, Dieter Haemmerich, Cleber da Silva Pinheiro, Adson Ferreira da Rocha
Primary Institution: University of Brasilia
Hypothesis
How does a variable heat transfer coefficient affect tissue temperature during radiofrequency tumor ablation near large vessels?
Conclusion
Modeling the heat sink effect of large vessels with a constant heat transfer coefficient yields accurate results for typical tumor ablation procedures lasting over 5 minutes.
Supporting Evidence
- The study found that for short ablation durations, using a constant heat transfer coefficient can lead to significant errors in estimating the coagulation zone.
- For longer ablation procedures, the results were similar whether a constant or variable heat transfer coefficient was used.
Takeaway
This study shows that for longer tumor treatments, using a constant heat transfer value works well, but for shorter treatments, a changing value might be needed.
Methodology
The study used finite-element modeling to simulate RF hepatic ablation with varying distances from a large vessel.
Limitations
The study primarily focused on the temperature field close to large vessels and did not simulate a full clinical situation.
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
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