Interventional Radiology Basics
What is 'interventional radiology'?
Interventional radiology is the branch of radiology involved in providing minimally invasive surgeries using radiology image guidance.
How does interventional radiology differ from diagnostic radiology?
Interventional radiology is effectively the surgical wing of diagnostic radiology.
How is interventional radiology related to diagnostic radiology?
Interventional radiology and diagnostic radiology are closely interrelated. Diagnostic radiology allows us to obtain images that can help us in finding things like masses. Interventional radiology on the other hand is the section of radiology that allows us to go one step, or more steps further. And it becomes the surgery that then is necessary in order to establish a more precise diagnosis or provide treatment for some conditions that are revealed by the diagnostic radiology imaging.
How many procedures are considered interventional radiology?
Interventional radiology encompasses hundreds of different kinds of procedures. Of the procedures that most patients are most familiar with, they include procedures such as balloon angioplasty of narrowed blood vessels or stenting. Biopsies through tiny little incisions in the skin are also part of the realm of interventional radiology. We will also place catheters or plastic tubes in areas where the tubes that normally conduct fluid from one part of the body to another could be blocked. So all of these are within that realm of interventional radiology.
How many years is an interventional radiologist in school?
The total amount of training that interventional radiologists requires to complete their formal training takes about fourteen years, including college education.
What are the advantages of interventional radiology?
Some of the advantages of interventional radiology involve our being able to perform surgeries with incisions that are maybe only as small as an eighth of an inch. This is of a tremendous value to many patients because the recovery time is usually much, much less than more formal open surgeries.
How will interventional radiology change in the future?
Interventional radiology and its minimally invasive techniques have branched off into the treatment of many, many disease processes. This will be of a major advantage to patients, because of the shorter down time that they will encounter if they have a medical problem that requires a surgical treatment.
