If you or a loved one is going to undergo a surgical procedure for skin cancer removal, or any other kind of small surgical procedure, it is important for you to study what is involved, so your mind can be put at ease. Most surgical procedures involve the use of electrosurgery.
We will answer several of the question you may have on electrosurgery. Electrosurgery is used for cutting and coagulating (stopping blood loss) of tissue with high-frequency, alternating currents.
The high frequency currents are typically over 300,000 hertz. This avoids neuromuscular stimulation.
The following are the more common terms used in this specialty. Electrodisection is a term used for describing cutting with radiofrequency (RF) -currents.
Coagulation is the correct terminology for the sealing of small vessels and capillaries with RF-currents, employing forceps, ball, blade and other large surface electrodes. Diathermy is another term that is often used to describe electrosurgery.
The use of electrosurgery or diathermy causes tissue destruction that allows cutting and the control of blood loss. Cautery is different from electrosurgery but is often used in electrosurgical vocabulary.
Tissue destruction with cautery is done by applying a hot instrument to tissue to achieve hemostasis. Electrosurgery uses the flow of current to heat tissue and achieve a cutting or coagulation effect.
The word cautery is commonly, but incorrectly, used to describe electrosurgery. Fulguration is the terminology for surface coagulation, produced by sparking of RF-currents between the point of an active electrode and the tissue surface.
Desiccation is a technique where an electrode is directly applied to tissue. This produces a larger zone of tissue destruction which can be beneficial for obtaining the effect the surgeon is attempting to create.
This term is used because, if proper equipment and technique are employed, it produces coagulation without visible sparking between the active electrode and the tissue. This is a different technique from fulguration.
Bovie is a trademark of one specific electrosurgical unit and the term is frequently, but incorrectly, used to describe electrosurgical units of other manufacturers. William Bovie invented the first electrosurgical generator with the help of Dr Harvey Cushing.
A generator is simply an electrosurgical unit. Surgical diathermy unit also means an electrosurgical generator.
Unipolar (or monopolar) electrosurgery employs a large patient electrode (patient plate) and a relatively small active electrode (needle, lancet, snare, forceps, etc.). Current is placed into the patient with a high current density with the small active electrode and is safely removed from the patient and returned back to the generator through a large patient return electrode.
The large electrode lowers the current density to minimize the generation of heat as current is removed from the patient and returned back to the generator to complete the electrosurgical circuit. In a bipolar circuit, both the active and return electrodes are contained on the surgical instrument.
Current only travels through the tissue between these two electrodes. Because current does not flow through the patient it is often viewed as being more safe.
However bipolar technology is limited in its ability to cut tissue. With this terminology in your pocket, you can better understand the jargon which will be used to explain the procedure to you.
Author Resource:-
Tommy Greene has worked in surgical equipment sales for the past 15 years. He has great advice and information on anElectrosurgery Generator units.
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