Abstract

XeCl excimer laser coronary angioplasty (ELCA), has gained more attention for the treatment of serious stenosis blocked by plaque. Low degrees of thermal damage after ablation of atherosclerotic plaques have been achieved by ELCA. However, the large number of risks associated with the procedure, for example, dissections or perforations of the coronary arteries limits its application. The laser treatment technique with high ablation efficiency but low arterial wall injury is desirable. Mid-infrared laser with a wavelength of 5.75 Pm is selectively well absorbed in C=O stretching vibration mode of ester bonds in cholesteryl ester. We studied the effectiveness of nanosecond pulsed laser at 5.75 Pm for novel less-invasive laser angioplasty. In this study, we used a mid-infrared tunable solid-state laser which is operated by difference-frequency generation, at 5.75 Pm, a pulse width of 5 ns and a pulse repetition rate of 10 Hz as a treatment light source, and a thoracic aorta of WHHLMI rabbit as an atherosclerosis model. As a result, less-invasive treatment parameters for removing atherosclerotic plaques in a wet condition were confirmed. This study shows that the nanosecond pulsed laser irradiation at 5.75 Pm is a powerful tool for selective and less-invasive treatment of atherosclerotic plaques.

© 2009 OSA/SPIE