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Conventional administration of drugs for urologic pathologies
is either by the systemic route or via intravesical instillation and subsequent
passive diffusion into the urothelium. The well documented concerns with
systemic administration are the small quantities of drug locating at the
site of disease; and side effects which are occasionally severe. The problems
associated with conventional intravesical instillation are the slow rate
of diffusion across the tightly knit urothelium and a fundamental inability
to control the rate of drug administration. Now, a controllable method for
delivery of drugs into the bladder wall and prostatic urethra has been developed
by Physion. It comprises a non-invasive, painless local drug administration
which provides greater clinical efficacy than does passive diffusion yet
without the side effects seen with systemic administration. EMDA utilizes
an electrical current to impart an accelerated, directional (towards the
tissues) movement of ionized drugs in an intravesical solution, which results
in greater quantities of drugs being delivered to greater tissue depths
than is achievable by passive diffusion. Furthermore, the rate of drug administration
is fully controllable simply by varying the intensity of the electric current. |