The delivery of therapeutic to the interior lumen walls of a diseased vessel is an important, often repeated, procedure in the practice of modern medicine. The delivery of the therapeutic can be completed through the use of numerous devices and procedures including direct injection by syringe and needle, pneumatic injection of the therapeutic into the diseased tissue, and the release of the therapeutic, near the target site, by the distal end of a catheter inserted into the lumen. When the diseased or otherwise targeted area is irregularly shaped its unorthodox shape can retard the effective and uniform delivery and absorption of the therapeutic at the target site. For example, as can be seen in FIG. 1, which depicts a drug delivery bladder 13 being used to place therapeutic against the interior walls of lumen 12 in vessel 10, the walls of the bladder 13 do not touch all of the walls of the lumen 12. As can be seen the vessel 10 contains a calcification 11 that acts to distort the configuration of lumen 12. Previously round, the lumen 12 has been distorted into a reniform configuration due to the disforming forces of the calcification 11. Accordingly, when the bladder 13, located on the distal end of a catheter 14 is inflated, only a portion of the bladder's 13 exterior surface comes in contact with the interior wall of the lumen 12 and, thus, only this contacted portion can be directly reached by the therapeutic. Likewise, when the wall of the lumen 12 has a cratered or otherwise irregular profile, which is typical in arteries inflicted with arteriosclerosis, the expanding bladder is unable to contact the entire surface area of the wall of the lumen 12. When this occurs, therapeutic being delivered is sporadically and unevenly placed at the target site, leaving portions of the lumen wall unexposed to the therapeutic. FIG. 1a provides an illustrative enlarged example of an interface between a bladder surface 15 and an irregularly shaped lumen wall 16. As is evident, certain craters 17 of the lumen wall 16 are not in contact with the bladder surface 15. Therefore, irregularly shaped lumen walls present an impediment to and a retarding factor in the delivery of therapeutic to the irregularly shaped lumen walls.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds