The Armor Men's Health Show

Ultrasound All Around: Hugo Embert of EDAP TMS on the Latest and Greatest Ultrasound Technology

• Dr. Sandeep Mistry and Donna Lee

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Thanks for tuning in to the Armor Men’s Health Hour Podcast today, where we bring you the latest and greatest in medical and urology care and the best urology humor out there.

In this segment,  Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee are joined by Hugo Embert of EDAP TMS, a European company and global leaders in the therapeutic use of ultrasound technology. Mr. Embert explains why ultrasound is so versatile and effective in treating a variety of medical conditions, including many that fall under the umbrella of urology. High Intensity Focused Ultrasound, or HIFU, is one such procedure. HIFU is used to treat prostate cancer without causing life altering side effects like incontinence and erectile dysfunction. Ultrasound is also used in biopsies to detect cancer, to treat erectile dysfunction by regenerating tissue and blood flow, and even to break apart kidney stones. It is truly a revolutionary tool. If you or someone you love is interested in learning more about HIFU or NAU Urology Specialists' cutting edge use of medical technology, give us a call today!

If you enjoyed today’s episode, don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share us with a friend! As always, be well!

Dr. Mistry is a board-certified urologist and has been treating patients in the Austin and Greater Williamson County area since he started his private practice in 2007.

We enjoy hearing from you! Email us at armormenshealth@gmail.com and we’ll answer your question in an upcoming episode!

Phone: (512) 238-0762
Email: Armormenshealth@gmail.com
Website: Armormenshealth.com

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Speaker 1:

Welcome back to the Armor Men's Health Hour with Dr. Mistry and Donna Lee.

Dr. Mistry:

Hello and welcome to the Armor Men's Health Hour. I'm Dr. Mistry, your host, here as always with my ever-helpful, effervescent, and wonderful office manager and co- host, Donna Lee.

Donna Lee:

That's right. I am ever helpful.

Dr. Mistry:

Ever helpful.

Donna Lee:

I liked it. I'll take that.

Dr. Mistry:

You know, our patients love to call and talk to you on the phone. Makes me feel a little unspecial.

Donna Lee:

You know why? Because I'm funnier than you are.

Dr. Mistry:

Well...

Donna Lee:

So there's that. I have a surprise for you.

Dr. Mistry:

Oh boy.

Donna Lee:

You know feed spot, the group that gave us the award for the top being the top 15 podcasts for men's health?

Dr. Mistry:

Yes. Yes.

Donna Lee:

They granted us another award and we are in the top 30 of all men's wellness programs in podcasts.

Dr. Mistry:

That's great.

Donna Lee:

Yes. And guess what number we came in at, at the top 30?

Dr. Mistry:

Come on, come on.

Donna Lee:

Number two.

Dr. Mistry:

Woohoo! Who was at number one?

Donna Lee:

Some other guy, I wanted Google that guy. But yeah.

Dr. Mistry:

Well that guy better watch, that guy better watch out. We're gunning for him.

Donna Lee:

That's right. We actually...see, I told you, put it out to the universe and we'll actually win things. And we finally won some awards.

Dr. Mistry:

There you go. I'm a board certified urologist is a men's health show. This show's brought to you by...

Donna Lee:

An award winning men's health show.

Dr. Mistry:

This show's brought to you by our urology practice NAU Urology Specialists. This is a urology group that I started in 2007. We have grown to four physicians. We have five physician assistant and nurse practitioners. We have pelvic floor, physical therapy, sex therapy, nutrition, and really what I believe to be the most comprehensive approach to men's health and urologic health that you're going to find.

Donna Lee:

And that's why we're award-winning again.

Dr. Mistry:

Yeah, I think we're award-winning because I'm so funny.

Donna Lee:

Uh no. I think you're just really smart. And I'm the funny, cute one.

Dr. Mistry:

Well...And you know, what puts us really at the forefront?

Donna Lee:

Your smartness?

Dr. Mistry:

Our amazing people that we have on board. And if people want to come visit us as a patient, how do they get ahold of us and where our offices?

Donna Lee:

That's right. You can call me directly at(512) 238-0762. And I will tell you all about our awards fake and real. And we are located in Round Rock, North Austin, South Austin, and Dripping Springs, Texas. Our website is armormenshealth.com and you can send us questions to armormenshealth@gmail.com, where we will answer them anonymously and please send us those questions are amazing. We get them all the time and we love them.

Dr. Mistry:

And we love them. So we love your questions and that really drive our show. Another thing that drives our show is cutting edge technology.

Donna Lee:

That's right. What a nice segue.

Dr. Mistry:

You know what I'm saying? And for years now, I think longer than most urologists in the United States, I've been using high intensity focused ultrasound to treat prostate cancer.

Donna Lee:

That's right. And it's not an ultrasound as it sounds.

Dr. Mistry:

It's not an imaging ultrasound.

Donna Lee:

Yeah. You're not going to like an imaging department and getting a little quick scan. But this is a really amazing non-invasive procedure.

Dr. Mistry:

That's right. And today we have Hugo Embert from Edap Technologies, which is a European company that has really pioneered the, the technology that I use and that the practitioners here in our office use for treatment of prostate cancer. And I thank you so much for joining us today, Hugo.

Hugo Embert:

Thank you for having me.

Donna Lee:

Welcome back!

Dr. Mistry:

Now although a European based company, your American headquarters are right here in Austin, Texas.

Hugo Embert:

That's that's correct. The, the worldwide headquarters of the company are located in Lyon, in France. And a few years ago, we decided to, to set up the headquarters of our US operations here in Austin, this beautiful Austin.

Donna Lee:

France to Austin.

Dr. Mistry:

And so when we talk about using ultrasound, we've used ultrasound, you know, ultrasound is just in a calm way when the waves are kind of low amplitude and low intensity, we use it to image things we use because it's a sound wave that bounces off something and bounces back, and you can look at things without radiation. We use it for kidneys all the time. We use it for stomach and gallbladder. We use it for abdominal ultrasound, trans vaginal ultrasound. But then if you make the energy a little bit more intense, you can actually like destroy things like the military uses ultrasound to like, as a weapon.

Hugo Embert:

This is absolutely correct. We, we developed, actually it was based on technology from 30, 40 years ago when people started to, to increase the intensity of those ultrasound. And instead of sending them parallel with each other, starting to focus them. So to point a bunch of those ultrasound waves into a single point, and just like you use your magnifying glass to, to focus the rays of the sun to burn leaf, we do exactly the same with ultrasound. So very high intensity focused ultrasound, you focus them to a single point, and at this point you are able to increase, elevate the temperature to a, to a burning temperature, to about a 190 degrees Fahrenheit, more or less. So, by doing this, you don't damage anything in between the transducer--so the portion that emits the ultrasound--and that focal point.

Dr. Mistry:

Probably invented by some mad scientists in Germany during World War II. Can you imagine going,"Ha ha ha ha ha!" And then, and then, and then the American soldiers go in there and say,"We've, we've captured it!" I've recently been watching a lot of Marvel, old episodes of captain America and maybe a lot of my analogies from there now.

Donna Lee:

Oh boy, well, that's better than sports. You had terrible analogies to sports.

Dr. Mistry:

That's right. I'm not very good with that. I'm just going to stick to Marvel. And so in urology, we use ultrasound a lot. When we do prostate biopsies, we use an ultrasound to image the prostate, to find where the cancer is. For kidney stones, we use ultrasound--also called shockwave lithotripsy--to break apart stones. We even use ultrasound to help people with their erections. We use ultrasound to help regenerate nerve and blood tissues. I mean, urologists may be the ultrasound kings.

Hugo Embert:

Yeah. And, and ultrasound is used even outside of urology in a lot of different...

Dr. Mistry:

There's outside of urology...?

Hugo Embert:

There's a little bit, there's a couple of things around. But even when we're discussing about those high intensity ultrasound, what we're doing with the prostate there's, they're applications of the same technology to, to treat uterine fibroids, to treat various neurological pathologies.

Dr. Mistry:

I'm hoping we can use it for liver tumors in the future too, because those are very hard to treat sometimes.

Hugo Embert:

Yes, we've done some, we've done some clinical trials on liver tumors, pancreatic tumors, on endometriosis, as well as in the brain in Parkinson's disease. This is an applications becoming more and more, more and more used, especially here in the US. So more and more top level centers offer the option of sending high intensity focused ultrasound through the brain, so without any incision, through the brain to really target those later portions of the brain and burn them to remove all those Parkinson and essential tremors.

Dr. Mistry:

So when we talk about prostate, though, what we're really trying to do by focusing this energy and this heat, we're able to treat prostate cancer in a way that reduces the two biggest side-effects of prostate cancer treatment that we worry about: impotence and incontinence. And I have had exceptional treatment success with it since starting to do HIFU, and last year, our practice was one of the top HIFU providers in the country last year. We've had exceptional success with it. And this year in 2021 marks a market change in how HIFU is being covered by insurance. And I think this is a very exciting time for the technology.

Hugo Embert:

That's correct. It, it took a, took a little while for, for the technology to, to land in the US. The FDA process is a, is a fairly long process. So it landed in the US about 10, 15 years after it started to be in used in Europe.

Dr. Mistry:

And for many years, it wasn't covered by insurance.

Hugo Embert:

It was not at all.

Dr. Mistry:

So, but this year is the first year that Medicare and government payers will pay for HIFU. So for those men out there diagnosed with prostate cancer, or if you have a prostate cancer that you've been waiting and watching, and would like to get a better handle on, you know, the HIFU allows you to have, you know, almost your cake and eat it too. You get the, the treatment for the cancer by burning it with an image guidance, and then you don't have to suffer the consequences or side effects of it. And what's awesome is now we can use MRI technology, targeted biopsies, all of these things. Really the, the Holy Grail of prostate cancer management that we've been seeking for so many years. You know, HIFU really offers a promise of getting us closer to that, that Holy Grail.

Hugo Embert:

That's correct. That's correct. Dr. Mistry. The whole, the whole management of prostate cancer as has evolved a lot. The technologies around for visualizing the cancer, for detecting the cancer, for knowing where the cancer is exactly in the prostate has brought so many options and such a big opportunity for high intensity focused ultrasound because as opposed to you were able to do 10, 15 years ago, which is, you don't know exactly where the cancer in the prostate, so you just radiate or do a surgery and take the whole prostate out, now with high intensity focused ultrasound, thanks to the MRI, thanks to those guided biopsies, you're able to visualize which part of the prostate harbors the cancer and go and focus those high intensity focused ultrasound on this part of the prostate and leave the rest of the prostate completely untouched. By doing so, you minimize completely the side effects linked to continence, incontinence, and erectile dysfunction.

Dr. Mistry:

And erectile dysfunction. And we've had patients that come from all over the country. In the middle of COVID we had, because New York got shut down, we had people flying in from New York, we've had people from California, and all the wide range. We have older guys who want to keep their erections young guys who want to keep their functional status and not have surgery and have it treated. And I think that we've had an excellent program and, and, and excellent outcomes. And I want to thank you and your company for really allowing Austin-based physicians to be at the forefront of HIFU technology. Thank you so much, Hugo.

Hugo Embert:

You're welcome.

Dr. Mistry:

Donna wanted to tell people how to get ahold of us, and if they have been diagnosed with prostate cancer and want a second opinion, we love second opinions.

Donna Lee:

You are the second opinion King, and you give a free consultation for anybody interested in HIFU.

Dr. Mistry:

That's right, anywhere in the world. So if you're in Indonesia and you wanted some information...

Donna Lee:

I don't know if we'll...

Dr. Mistry:

We're worldwide.

Donna Lee:

We are worldwide, and everybody's listening to our podcasts all over. You can catch our podcasts wherever you listen to free podcasts. Thank you. The armor men's health hour is brought to you by urology specialists for questions, or to schedule an appointment, please call(512) 238-0762 or online at armor men's health.com.