Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
- n. Pulverization of kidney stones or gallstones by means of a lithotripter.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
- n. The breaking-up of kidney stones or similar calculi by means of ultrasound
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
- n. The operation of crushing a stone in the bladder or urethra to reduce it to particles small enough to be voided; lithotrity. It may be performed with an instrument called lithotriptor or lithotrite (also called a lithoclast); or, more recently, may be accomplished by devices using ultrasonic waves to fragment the stones.
from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Same as lithotrity.
Etymologies
Examples
-
Nowadays, through a process called lithotripsy, they can send high-energy shock waves into the body to dissolve those stones without the risks associated with invasive surgery.
-
It's the same technology used since the 1980s to blast kidney stones, an application called lithotripsy, but for foot problems doctors use less intense shock waves.
-
Physicians now use wave technology to penetrate patients’ bodies from a distance and dissolve kidney stones a procedure called lithotripsy, whereas just a few years ago surgeons needed to cut open the patient to gain access to the kidneys.
-
She has since had three lithotripsy surgeries, all of which she says were unsuccessful, and has had to be hospitalized to drain the blood from her kidneys.
-
The number of CAT scans and MRIs and the lithotripsy machine for kidney stones in the United States far superior in terms of the availability.
-
I understand that tens of thousands .... [pauses] [Hospital Director Raul Gomez] Cabrera, I do not remember what figure you mentioned regarding lithotripsy.
-
How much would a lithotripsy cost to resolve serious renal problems?
-
This sophisticated type of medicine calls for the use of lithotripsy, computerized tomography, linear accelerators, which we are already purchasing, nuclear magnetic resonance, and a great deal of laboratory equipment used in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases.
-
I suspect that Posterity will not thank us for the hereditary disease of Carrara we are entailing on him, and will try some heroic remedy, perhaps lithotripsy.
-
It now has a non-invasive lithotripsy machine to break up kidney stones and a new 32-slice CT scanner that produces clearer images for better diagnostics.
treeseed commented on the word lithotripsy
Lithotripsy is a surgical procedure that attempts to break up a kidney stone or a stone in the gallbladder with minimal collateral damage by using an externally applied, focused, high-intensity acoustic pulse.
The scientific name of this procedure is Extracorporeal Shock Wave Lithotripsy (ESWL).
_Wikipedia
February 4, 2008