Hacker News Reader

Pardon the naive question, I don't know how localized therapies are today, but hasn't there been research into developing fake foreign capillaries to be implanted non invasively to deliver drugs right on target ?

ps: I remember seeing more 'barbaric' version of the idea, namely metal pipes planted in the patient as a direct path. I was wondering about something more organic.

View on HN

I'm not an expert, but I think there's been a variety of attempts for vascular renormalization--to restore the normal flow of vessels to allow for drug delivery, etc. Rakesh Jain's lab (at MGH) is a big player in this field and is worth looking up if you're interested.

I'm not personally familiar with work in developing capillary devices, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if this was an approach under development--it certainly makes a lot of sense.

I was more thinking about artificial pathways, not renormalization (which sound very very difficult) but I'm happy to learn it's considered. Thanks a lot for the name too.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com