Technology is known to take enormous steps forward. This is how something extraordinary can occur. An excellence all Italian concerning health. Yes, because in our peninsula there is not only bad health, often among the first news on the news. But there is good, indeed excellent news, concerning health facilities of excellence. And that's what we want to tell you about: the use of the 3D printer in a hospital and especially for oncological treatments.
3D printer the experience of a hospital in Bologna
What was experienced in an Italian hospital made so much news that it was also at the center of a service of the television broadcast of the "Hyenas". Episode dedicated to good Italian health. This is the experience of the Rizzoli hospital in Bologna. A health facility that deals with orthopedics. Here, not only are traumas treated, such as injuries to the limbs, but also tumors. A new technique to combat oncological pathologies, through the 3D printer.
Tumors treated with the printer that reproduces some limbs
The experiment started a few months ago by a doctor, Alessandro Gasbarrini, director of Rizzoli's oncological and degenerative spinal surgery. The experimentation deals with controlling subjects suffering from a tumor, for example those of the bones or the spine. The parts of the body affected by the disease are then studied. Then printed the carbon prosthesis in practice equal to the part of the diseased bone. The ready prosthesis will then be implanted through surgery. The engineers who deal with new technologies help the doctor. Through the images reproduced by the diagnostic analyzes of the CT scan and resonance they reconstructed the sick part. This type of experimentation is also ensured by the national health service, therefore free for patients.
The use of the printer during the Covid emergency
And if the one experienced a few months ago at Rizzoli is one of the many Italian excellences concerning healthcare, there are others that have become relevant in recent months. In full emergency Covid 19 in some Italian but also foreign cities experimented with a new technique with the 3D printer. Used a snorkeling mask that helps those who go underwater to facilitate breathing. With the application of a 3D printed valve these masks have been transformed into respiratory masks for emergency and especially in sub-intensive therapy.
But the use of these printers in healthcare has come a long way. There are many in many structures sanitary to print parts of the body and then study them and be able to treat their patients. Meanwhile, Rizzoli's experience teaches us how significant progress can be made also in Italy and in cancer treatment. A project that will certainly be significant for the medicine of the future. The use of 3D printers to study the reproduction of human organs before surgery is a reality. It will probably soon lead to the creation of completely artificial organs.
