| abstract |
A novel therapeutic instrument and technique for delivering thermal energy to a target tissue volume or site in an interior of a patient's body in a “non-invasive” manner for medical purposes, such as selective cell damage to thereafter cause population of the extracellular compartment of the injury site with a collagen fiber matrix. An exemplary embodiment of the invention is a catheter-like device dimensioned for transurethral introduction. The distal working end has radiused laterally-extending elements that are deployable to engage target tissues around the patient's sphincter from both within the bladder and within the urethra. RF electrodes are carried on the working faces of the opposing laterally-extending elements for delivering thermal energy to the target tissues. The working end is capable of site-specific compression of the target tissue to decrease the level of extracellular fluid (ECF) of the tissue to increase its resistance to RF energy, thus allowing the device to thermally treat (damage cells) in subsurface tissue sites without ablating surface tissues. |