Study of Focal Ablation of the Prostate With NanoTherm® Therapy System for Intermediate-Risk Prostate Cancer

Presently, patients having intermediate-risk prostate carcinoma have to make a very difficult decision regarding treatment, as active surveillance will not immediately alter the current quality of life. However, because there is a risk of progressive disease or due to patient anxiety due to an untreated tumor, many patients opt for active treatment, often using radiation or prostatectomy, and sometimes in combination with androgen deprivation. Unfortunately, radiation, surgery, and androgen deprivation have multiple and potentially profound side effects including sexual, urinary, and bowel complications. As a small fraction of men dies from this disease, the number of men needed to treat to prevent one death is large, resulting in many men with side effects or complications to help prevent the one death. It is for these reasons that there is a major need for focal therapy for this group of patients who most commonly are treated actively with surgery or radiation; such focal therapy could ablate the detected tumor(s) within the prostate, control the disease while avoiding side effects of whole gland therapies and controlling tumor growth within the prostate detected by (multiparameter-) MRI and histopathologically confirmed by biopsy. MagForce NanoTherm® Therapy offers this option by noninvasive ablation of small tumors in a 1-2 ml target volume of the prostate, a treatment that is not possible with any other technology on the market.

This study evaluates the use of NanoTherm ablation as a method of treating these intermediate grade lesions allowing patients to return to active surveillance without definitive treatment such as external beam radiation or prostatectomy.