IRTIC (Institut de Recherche des Techniques Interventionnelles en Cancérologie; Research Institute on Interventional Techniques in Oncology) aims at putting in place a collaborative, state-of-the-art surgical research facility. IRTIC wants develop tomorrow digital surgery by promoting multidisciplinary scientific research in oncology.
A problem common to most primary and secondary solid tumours in solid organs the function of which is not dependent on their anatomy (prostate, breast, liver, lung, pancreas, kidney, thyroid, adrenal glands) is their curative ablation, while limiting the secondary effects of surgery or irradiation, as performed at present.
IRTIC is a research institute that will be created in proximity of a university hospital and that will ultimately group together clinicians, surgeons, engineers and researchers focused on diagnostic imaging and interventional techniques. Thanks to the work of integration and synthesis in collaboration with engineers, new technological procedures will be developed and tested for application in the domain of ablative therapy. Developed in a multimodal operating room with intrabody videoscopy (direct vision, fluoroscopic control…) and based on the guidance by diagnostic imaging (sonography, CT, MRI…), the novel tumour ablation techniques will be oriented towards the implementation of digital surgical procedures.
IRTIC wishes to promote a dynamic approach based on the new paradigm of the clinicians’ requirements that precede the industrial offer. Mathematical models, pre-therapeutic simulations and experiments on big animals, according to the best medical standards, will precede the clinical implementation of the new techniques. To this aim, we plan to:
- Adapt the existing technologies and transfer innovative techniques to surgery
- Reduce the time-to-market of the new procedures thanks to clinical research
- IRTIC will contribute to:
- Create cross-professional, multidisciplinary collaborative research for knowledge integration and technological transfer: IRTIC will group together experts in different clinical specialties (surgeons, radiologists, oncologists, immunologists) as well as public- and private-sector researchers and engineers.
- Develop a patient-centred approach with realistic treatment conditions: we plan to develop less aggressive and more effective treatment procedures that can better answer the care needs of patients with cancer.
- • Strengthen research in the framework of public-private partnerships: IRTIC will develop public-private partnerships and collaborative projects with all the players involved in minimally invasive digital surgery.