# Ultrasound in Medical Therapy

## Ultrasound in Medical Therapy

Ultrasound, like any wave, carries energy that can be absorbed by the medium carrying it, producing effects that vary with intensity. When focused to intensities of $${\text{10}}^{\text{3}}$$ to $${\text{10}}^{\text{5}}$$$${\text{W/m}}^{\text{2}}$$, ultrasound can be used to shatter gallstones or pulverize cancerous tissue in surgical procedures. (See this figure.) Intensities this great can damage individual cells, variously causing their protoplasm to stream inside them, altering their permeability, or rupturing their walls through cavitation. Cavitation is the creation of vapor cavities in a fluid—the longitudinal vibrations in ultrasound alternatively compress and expand the medium, and at sufficient amplitudes the expansion separates molecules. Most cavitation damage is done when the cavities collapse, producing even greater shock pressures.

Most of the energy carried by high-intensity ultrasound in tissue is converted to thermal energy. In fact, intensities of $${\text{10}}^{3}$$ to $${\text{10}}^{4}\phantom{\rule{0.25em}{0ex}}{\text{W/m}}^{2}$$ are commonly used for deep-heat treatments called ultrasound diathermy. Frequencies of 0.8 to 1 MHz are typical. In both athletics and physical therapy, ultrasound diathermy is most often applied to injured or overworked muscles to relieve pain and improve flexibility. Skill is needed by the therapist to avoid “bone burns” and other tissue damage caused by overheating and cavitation, sometimes made worse by reflection and focusing of the ultrasound by joint and bone tissue.

In some instances, you may encounter a different decibel scale, called the sound pressure level, when ultrasound travels in water or in human and other biological tissues. We shall not use the scale here, but it is notable that numbers for sound pressure levels range 60 to 70 dB higher than you would quote for $$\beta$$, the sound intensity level used in this text. Should you encounter a sound pressure level of 220 decibels, then, it is not an astronomically high intensity, but equivalent to about 155 dB—high enough to destroy tissue, but not as unreasonably high as it might seem at first.

Do you want to suggest a correction or an addition to this content? Leave Contribution