An investigation of the physical forces leading to thrombosis disruption by cavitation.

Ultrasound therapy has proven to be an efficient and safe modality for the treatment of acute arterial occlusions, and the use of therapeutic ultrasound for the treatment of thrombosis and vascular diseases holds great promise in overcoming the limitations of other available therapies. Still, there exists little published work that covers the different phenomena that take place in a thorough and comprehensive way. In this paper, we endeavor to address the subject by reviewing work on the physical properties of ultrasound propagation in the blood arteries as it relates to the cavitation of microbubbles, and we compare the impact of the different forces at work for clot disruption. Our conclusion is that the most important effect of ultrasound in the treatment of thrombotic disorders is the liquid-jet impact forces that result from strong bubble collapses in the vicinity of solid boundaries.