Rrelapsed Graves' DiseaseHIFURGDNCT02685514
A Evaluation of High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU) in the Treatment of Relapsed Graves' Disease
A study testing HIFU Graves in people with Rrelapsed Graves' Disease, run by The University of Hong Kong at 1 site in Hong Kong.
Trial summary
To evaluate the short-term efficiency and safety of HIFU treatment in the relapsed Graves' disease. Read more about this study
- Who is it for?
- Ages 18 years and older
- Conditions the study is for
- Rrelapsed Graves' Disease
- What is being tested?
- HIFU Graves
- Type of treatment
- Medical device
- Could I receive a placebo?
- No, everyone receives an active treatment
- How many people
- 22 participants
- Where
- 1 siteHong Kong
- Study dates
- Oct 2015to Apr 2016
- Phase
- Interventional
- Are there results?
- None posted in the registry
Key requirements
Who can take part, as listed by the sponsor. Only the study team can confirm whether you are eligible, so take this list to your doctor.
- Ages 18 years and older
- All sexes
- No healthy volunteers
- Adult, Older adult
Who may be able to join
- age older than 18 years;
- relapsed Graves' disease despite an adequate ATD treatment for 18 months or more;
- HIFU accessibility of the targeted area (distance between the skin and the anterior surface of the nodule less than 10 mm; with no interference of the collarbone with HIFU unit movements);
- normal thyrotropin concentration before procedure;
- on at least 2-week of β-blockade prior to HIFU; and
- absence of vocal cord immobility at laryngoscopy.
Who cannot join
- patients who prefer or indicated for surgery;
- head and/or neck disease preventing hyperextension of the neck;
- history of thyroid cancer or other malignant tumors in the neck region;
- history of neck irradiation;
- severe Grave's ophthalmopathy (GO);
- large compressive goiter;
- pregnancy or lactation; and
- any contraindication related to intravenous moderate sedation.
Trial locations and contacts
1 site in 1 country.
About this study
Official title: A Prospective Evaluation of High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU) in the Treatment of Relapsed Graves' Disease
To evaluate the short-term efficiency and safety of HIFU treatment in the relapsed Graves' disease.
Read the detailed description
Grave's disease is the most common cause of hyperthyroidism and affects approximately 2% of women and 0.2% of men in the population. The use of antithyroid drugs (ATD) has been the first-line of treatment for Graves' disease in many centers for decades, and its use has been increasing worldwide. One reason for this is that it may induce remission, whereas radioiodine (RAI) and surgery often lead to hypothyroidism and other complications in addition to hospitalization and radiation exposure. However, ATD use is also associated with increasing risk of some adverse minor effects such as skin rash, gastric intolerance, and arthralgia in 5% of patients. Furthermore, major adverse events, such as agranulocytosis and hepatotoxicity may be life-threatening but are rare (<0.5% of cases). These usually occur during the first three to six months of treatment, and tend to be associated with high ATD doses. Therefore, the recommended duration of ATD treatment is generally not longer than 12-24 months. However, despite adequate medical treatment, up to 50-70% of patients with Graves' disease would relapse or recur and therefore, a more definitive approach using RAI treatment or thyroid surgery is eventually needed for the resolution of hyperthyroidism. Although RAI is considered safe and easy to manage, particularly in patients without Grave's ophthalmopathy (GO), subclinical and overt hypothyroidism may occur months or even years after the administration of RAI. Hence, long-term follow-up of thyroid function and GO as well as management of thyroxine replacement is necessary. Similarly, although surgery is the main therapeutic strategy, it carries a 2%-10% risk of complications such as hypocalcemia, transient or permanent recurrent laryngeal nerve palsy, bleeding, or postoperative infection. In view of these, various nonsurgical, minimally invasive treatment alternatives have been developed at specialized treatment centers.
High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is a noninvasive procedure that involves application of a focused high-energy ultrasound beam for thermal tissue ablation inside the targeted zone, with minimal effect on the surrounding tissue. This method has been applied for treatment of a variety of medical conditions such as uterine fibroids and prostate, breast, pancreatic, and liver tumors. A favorable outcome also has been observed in patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism. HIFU has also been proposed for thyroid nodule ablation . In a human feasibility study, 25 patients were treated 2 weeks before a scheduled thyroidectomy. Pathologic analysis demonstrated targeted tissue destruction of 2%-80% without any damage to neighboring structures. To the investigators knowledge, studies of follow-up after HIFU ablation of Graves' disease have not been published, except for one report where two patients received a combination of microwave ablation and RAI. Thus, the purpose of this prospective study is to assess the short-term efficacy and safety of US-guided HIFU ablation for the treatment of relapsed Graves' disease.
- Conditions
- Rrelapsed Graves' Disease
- Being tested
- HIFU Graves
- Keywords
- HIFU, Graves' disease, treatment
- Medical subject headings
- Graves Disease
What participants receive
What participants receive. In a randomised study each person is assigned to one group by chance.
HIFU GravesDevice
The HIFU treatment technique will be applied to the recruited participants
| Study group | Role | What they receive |
|---|---|---|
| HIFU Graves | Experimental | Applying the High intensity Focused Ultrasound treatment to the relapsed Graves' disease Patients. Receives: Device: HIFU Graves |
What is being measured
The primary outcome is the main question the study is designed to answer.
Remission rate of Graves' disease after one successful course of HIFU
To evaluate the remission rate of relapsed Graves' disease after 6 months of HIFU treatment
Measured: 6 months
Secondary outcomes (2)
The pain assessment (scoring 1-10) after treatment
Patient pain score immediately after HIFU treatment.
Measured: 6 months
Incidence of local or general adverse events
The incidence rate of local or general adverse events after completion of HIFU treatment session.
Measured: 6 months
Timeline
From the start of the study to its completion; the mark is today. Estimated dates are the sponsor’s plan.
- First posted18 Feb 2016 (estimated)
- Study startOct 2015
- Primary completionApr 2016
- Study completionApr 2016
Resources
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govThe registry entry this page is built from, with its full change history.
- Publications (13)Papers the sponsor has linked to this study.
- Other trials for Rrelapsed Graves' DiseaseStudies of the same condition, open and under way.
- More trials run by The University of Hong KongThe sponsor's other registered studies.
- What the trial phases meanHow a treatment moves from first tests in people to approval.
More details
For doctors and researchers: how the study is designed, who runs it, and its registry IDs.
Study design
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Phase N/A
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Enrolment
- 22 participants (actual)
Sponsor and investigators
- Lead sponsor
- The University of Hong Kong
- Sponsor type
- University, hospital or other
- Responsible party
- Principal investigator, Dr. Lang Hung Hin, Brian, The University of Hong Kong
- Investigators
- Hung Hin, Brian Lang, MBBS(Hons), Principal investigator, The University of Hong Kong
IDs, dates and publications
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT02685514
- Sponsor's protocol ID
- UW16-015
- Acronym
- HIFURGD
- Status last verified
- Nov 2016
- First submitted
- 14 Feb 2016
- Last updated
- 10 Nov 2016
- Results posted
- No
- Data monitoring committee
- Yes
- Individual data sharing
- Undecided
Publications
Cooper DS. Antithyroid drugs. N Engl J Med. 2005 Mar 3;352(9):905-17. doi: 10.1056/NEJMra042972. No abstract available.
PubMed 15745981Watanabe N, Narimatsu H, Noh JY, Yamaguchi T, Kobayashi K, Kami M, Kunii Y, Mukasa K, Ito K, Ito K. Antithyroid drug-induced hematopoietic damage: a retrospective cohort study of agranulocytosis and pancytopenia involving 50,385 patients with Graves' disease. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2012 Jan;97(1):E49-53. doi: 10.1210/jc.2011-2221. Epub 2011 Nov 2.
PubMed 22049174Yip J, Lang BH, Lo CY. Changing trend in surgical indication and management for Graves' disease. Am J Surg. 2012 Feb;203(2):162-7. doi: 10.1016/j.amjsurg.2011.01.029. Epub 2011 Jun 17.
PubMed 21683939Zhou YF. High intensity focused ultrasound in clinical tumor ablation. World J Clin Oncol. 2011 Jan 10;2(1):8-27. doi: 10.5306/wjco.v2.i1.8.
PubMed 21603311Kovatcheva RD, Vlahov JD, Shinkov AD, Borissova AM, Hwang JH, Arnaud F, Hegedus L. High-intensity focused ultrasound to treat primary hyperparathyroidism: a feasibility study in four patients. AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2010 Oct;195(4):830-5. doi: 10.2214/AJR.09.3932.
PubMed 20858805Esnault O, Franc B, Chapelon JY. Localized ablation of thyroid tissue by high-intensity focused ultrasound: improvement of noninvasive tissue necrosis methods. Thyroid. 2009 Oct;19(10):1085-91. doi: 10.1089/thy.2009.0121.
PubMed 19803790Esnault O, Franc B, Menegaux F, Rouxel A, De Kerviler E, Bourrier P, Lacoste F, Chapelon JY, Leenhardt L. High-intensity focused ultrasound ablation of thyroid nodules: first human feasibility study. Thyroid. 2011 Sep;21(9):965-73. doi: 10.1089/thy.2011.0141. Epub 2011 Aug 11.
PubMed 21834683Esnault O, Franc B, Monteil JP, Chapelon JY. High-intensity focused ultrasound for localized thyroid-tissue ablation: preliminary experimental animal study. Thyroid. 2004 Dec;14(12):1072-6. doi: 10.1089/thy.2004.14.1072.
PubMed 15650361Korkusuz H, Happel C, Koch DA, Gruenwald F. Combination of Ultrasound-Guided Percutaneous Microwave Ablation and Radioiodine Therapy in Benign Thyroid Disease: A 3-Month Follow-Up Study. Rofo. 2016 Jan;188(1):60-8. doi: 10.1055/s-0041-106538. Epub 2015 Nov 13.
PubMed 26566268Huh JY, Baek JH, Choi H, Kim JK, Lee JH. Symptomatic benign thyroid nodules: efficacy of additional radiofrequency ablation treatment session--prospective randomized study. Radiology. 2012 Jun;263(3):909-16. doi: 10.1148/radiol.12111300. Epub 2012 Mar 21.
PubMed 22438360Kovatcheva RD, Vlahov JD, Stoinov JI, Kirilov GG, Krivoshiev SG, Arnaud F, Ortuno C, Drueke TB. High-intensity focussed ultrasound (HIFU) treatment in uraemic secondary hyperparathyroidism. Nephrol Dial Transplant. 2012 Jan;27(1):76-80. doi: 10.1093/ndt/gfr590. Epub 2011 Oct 19.
PubMed 22015443Kovatcheva R, Vlahov J, Stoinov J, Lacoste F, Ortuno C, Zaletel K. US-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound as a promising non-invasive method for treatment of primary hyperparathyroidism. Eur Radiol. 2014 Sep;24(9):2052-8. doi: 10.1007/s00330-014-3252-4. Epub 2014 Jun 4.
PubMed 24895038Esnault O, Rouxel A, Le Nestour E, Gheron G, Leenhardt L. Minimally invasive ablation of a toxic thyroid nodule by high-intensity focused ultrasound. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol. 2010 Nov;31(10):1967-8. doi: 10.3174/ajnr.A1979. Epub 2010 Jan 14.
PubMed 20075098
Study at a glance
From the registry record, last updated by the sponsor on 10 Nov 2016. Recruitment status is as the sponsor reported it: confirm with the study team.
- Official title
- A Prospective Evaluation of High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU) in the Treatment of Relapsed Graves' Disease
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT02685514
- Acronym / sponsor ID
- HIFURGD / UW16-015
- Conditions
- Rrelapsed Graves' Disease
- Keywords
- HIFU, Graves' disease, treatment
- Study type
- Interventional
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Enrolment
- 22 participants (actual)
- Lead sponsor
- The University of Hong KongUniversity, hospital or other
- Study start
- Oct 2015
- Primary completion
- Apr 2016 (actual)
- Study completion
- Apr 2016 (actual)
- First posted
- 18 Feb 2016 (estimated)
- Results
- Not posted in the source record
Clinical summary
The research question as the sponsor registered it. This describes what the study plans to test, not what it found.
To evaluate the short-term efficiency and safety of HIFU treatment in the relapsed Graves' disease.
Detailed description
Grave's disease is the most common cause of hyperthyroidism and affects approximately 2% of women and 0.2% of men in the population. The use of antithyroid drugs (ATD) has been the first-line of treatment for Graves' disease in many centers for decades, and its use has been increasing worldwide. One reason for this is that it may induce remission, whereas radioiodine (RAI) and surgery often lead to hypothyroidism and other complications in addition to hospitalization and radiation exposure. However, ATD use is also associated with increasing risk of some adverse minor effects such as skin rash, gastric intolerance, and arthralgia in 5% of patients. Furthermore, major adverse events, such as agranulocytosis and hepatotoxicity may be life-threatening but are rare (<0.5% of cases). These usually occur during the first three to six months of treatment, and tend to be associated with high ATD doses. Therefore, the recommended duration of ATD treatment is generally not longer than 12-24 months. However, despite adequate medical treatment, up to 50-70% of patients with Graves' disease would relapse or recur and therefore, a more definitive approach using RAI treatment or thyroid surgery is eventually needed for the resolution of hyperthyroidism. Although RAI is considered safe and easy to manage, particularly in patients without Grave's ophthalmopathy (GO), subclinical and overt hypothyroidism may occur months or even years after the administration of RAI. Hence, long-term follow-up of thyroid function and GO as well as management of thyroxine replacement is necessary. Similarly, although surgery is the main therapeutic strategy, it carries a 2%-10% risk of complications such as hypocalcemia, transient or permanent recurrent laryngeal nerve palsy, bleeding, or postoperative infection. In view of these, various nonsurgical, minimally invasive treatment alternatives have been developed at specialized treatment centers.
High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) is a noninvasive procedure that involves application of a focused high-energy ultrasound beam for thermal tissue ablation inside the targeted zone, with minimal effect on the surrounding tissue. This method has been applied for treatment of a variety of medical conditions such as uterine fibroids and prostate, breast, pancreatic, and liver tumors. A favorable outcome also has been observed in patients with primary or secondary hyperparathyroidism. HIFU has also been proposed for thyroid nodule ablation . In a human feasibility study, 25 patients were treated 2 weeks before a scheduled thyroidectomy. Pathologic analysis demonstrated targeted tissue destruction of 2%-80% without any damage to neighboring structures. To the investigators knowledge, studies of follow-up after HIFU ablation of Graves' disease have not been published, except for one report where two patients received a combination of microwave ablation and RAI. Thus, the purpose of this prospective study is to assess the short-term efficacy and safety of US-guided HIFU ablation for the treatment of relapsed Graves' disease.
Study design
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Number of arms
- 1
| Arm | Type | Receives |
|---|---|---|
| HIFU Graves | Experimental | Device: HIFU GravesApplying the High intensity Focused Ultrasound treatment to the relapsed Graves' disease Patients. |
Who may qualify
- Ages
- 18 years and older
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Not accepted
- Age groups
- Adult, Older adult
Key inclusion criteria (6 listed)
- age older than 18 years;
- relapsed Graves' disease despite an adequate ATD treatment for 18 months or more;
- HIFU accessibility of the targeted area (distance between the skin and the anterior surface of the nodule less than 10 mm; with no interference of the collarbone with HIFU unit movements);
- normal thyrotropin concentration before procedure;
- on at least 2-week of β-blockade prior to HIFU; and
Key exclusion criteria (8 listed)
- patients who prefer or indicated for surgery;
- head and/or neck disease preventing hyperextension of the neck;
- history of thyroid cancer or other malignant tumors in the neck region;
- history of neck irradiation;
- severe Grave's ophthalmopathy (GO);
Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening; this overview does not establish that a patient qualifies. Full inclusion and exclusion criteria.
Interventions
| Intervention | Type | Arms |
|---|---|---|
| HIFU GravesThe HIFU treatment technique will be applied to the recruited participants | Device | HIFU Graves |
Primary outcome
Remission rate of Graves' disease after one successful course of HIFU
Time frame: 6 months
To evaluate the remission rate of relapsed Graves' disease after 6 months of HIFU treatment
2 secondary outcomes
The pain assessment (scoring 1-10) after treatment
Time frame: 6 months
Incidence of local or general adverse events
Time frame: 6 months
Results and safety
The study is completed, but results are not available in the source record. That does not mean the treatment did or did not work.
Research links
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govLast updated by the sponsor 10 Nov 2016.
- Background: PubMed 15745981Cooper DS. Antithyroid drugs. N Engl J Med. 2005 Mar 3;352(9):905-17. doi: 10.1056/NEJMra042972. No abstract available.
- Background: PubMed 22049174Watanabe N, Narimatsu H, Noh JY, Yamaguchi T, Kobayashi K, Kami M, Kunii Y, Mukasa K, Ito K, Ito K. Antithyroid drug-induced hematopoietic damage: a retrospective cohort study of agranulocytosis and pancytopenia involving 50,385 patients with Graves' disease. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2012 Jan;97(1):E49-53. doi: 10.1210/jc.2011-2221. Epub 2011 Nov 2.
- Background: PubMed 21683939Yip J, Lang BH, Lo CY. Changing trend in surgical indication and management for Graves' disease. Am J Surg. 2012 Feb;203(2):162-7. doi: 10.1016/j.amjsurg.2011.01.029. Epub 2011 Jun 17.
- Background: PubMed 21603311Zhou YF. High intensity focused ultrasound in clinical tumor ablation. World J Clin Oncol. 2011 Jan 10;2(1):8-27. doi: 10.5306/wjco.v2.i1.8.
- Background: PubMed 20858805Kovatcheva RD, Vlahov JD, Shinkov AD, Borissova AM, Hwang JH, Arnaud F, Hegedus L. High-intensity focused ultrasound to treat primary hyperparathyroidism: a feasibility study in four patients. AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2010 Oct;195(4):830-5. doi: 10.2214/AJR.09.3932.
- Background: PubMed 19803790Esnault O, Franc B, Chapelon JY. Localized ablation of thyroid tissue by high-intensity focused ultrasound: improvement of noninvasive tissue necrosis methods. Thyroid. 2009 Oct;19(10):1085-91. doi: 10.1089/thy.2009.0121.
- Background: PubMed 21834683Esnault O, Franc B, Menegaux F, Rouxel A, De Kerviler E, Bourrier P, Lacoste F, Chapelon JY, Leenhardt L. High-intensity focused ultrasound ablation of thyroid nodules: first human feasibility study. Thyroid. 2011 Sep;21(9):965-73. doi: 10.1089/thy.2011.0141. Epub 2011 Aug 11.
- Background: PubMed 15650361Esnault O, Franc B, Monteil JP, Chapelon JY. High-intensity focused ultrasound for localized thyroid-tissue ablation: preliminary experimental animal study. Thyroid. 2004 Dec;14(12):1072-6. doi: 10.1089/thy.2004.14.1072.
- Background: PubMed 26566268Korkusuz H, Happel C, Koch DA, Gruenwald F. Combination of Ultrasound-Guided Percutaneous Microwave Ablation and Radioiodine Therapy in Benign Thyroid Disease: A 3-Month Follow-Up Study. Rofo. 2016 Jan;188(1):60-8. doi: 10.1055/s-0041-106538. Epub 2015 Nov 13.
- Background: PubMed 22438360Huh JY, Baek JH, Choi H, Kim JK, Lee JH. Symptomatic benign thyroid nodules: efficacy of additional radiofrequency ablation treatment session--prospective randomized study. Radiology. 2012 Jun;263(3):909-16. doi: 10.1148/radiol.12111300. Epub 2012 Mar 21.
- Background: PubMed 22015443Kovatcheva RD, Vlahov JD, Stoinov JI, Kirilov GG, Krivoshiev SG, Arnaud F, Ortuno C, Drueke TB. High-intensity focussed ultrasound (HIFU) treatment in uraemic secondary hyperparathyroidism. Nephrol Dial Transplant. 2012 Jan;27(1):76-80. doi: 10.1093/ndt/gfr590. Epub 2011 Oct 19.
- Background: PubMed 24895038Kovatcheva R, Vlahov J, Stoinov J, Lacoste F, Ortuno C, Zaletel K. US-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound as a promising non-invasive method for treatment of primary hyperparathyroidism. Eur Radiol. 2014 Sep;24(9):2052-8. doi: 10.1007/s00330-014-3252-4. Epub 2014 Jun 4.
- Individual participant dataSharing planned: Undecided
Referral and contact
AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals. Contact the study team or a site listed below; they decide who can take part. This study is not recruiting at the moment.
Hung Hin, Brian Lang, MBBS(Hons) principal investigator
The University of Hong Kong
1 site in 1 country: see every site and its status.
Questions about this trial
What is this clinical trial studying?
A study testing HIFU Graves in people with Rrelapsed Graves' Disease, run by The University of Hong Kong at 1 site in Hong Kong.
The full registered description is in the About this study section and the official record.
Who may be eligible to take part?
The sponsor lists 6 inclusion and 8 exclusion criteria. Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening, so read the full criteria and contact a listed site.
Is this clinical trial currently recruiting?
The record says: finished, as of the sponsor's last update on 10 Nov 2016. Status can change between updates, so confirm with the study contact before making plans.
Where is the study taking place?
The record lists 1 site in Hong Kong. Whether a site is taking part right now should be confirmed with that site. See every site.
What are the possible benefits and risks?
They depend on the study and the treatment, and no study can promise a benefit. The study team explains the known risks during informed consent, before anyone joins; the record itself does not list them.
Are results available for this study?
The study is completed, but results are not available in the source record. That does not mean the treatment did or did not work.
How can a doctor refer a patient or contact the research team?
The record lists no contact. The official record names the sponsor, who can be asked directly. AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals.
What does the primary outcome measure?
Remission rate of Graves' disease after one successful course of HIFU (time frame: 6 months). It is what the study was designed to measure, not a finding.
Where can I read the original study information?
On the ClinicalTrials.gov record for NCT02685514, which also lists 13 linked publications.
Does a listing mean the treatment is approved or proven to work?
No. A listing means the study is registered. It does not show that the treatment is safe, works, or is approved by a regulator.
How often is this information updated?
AzTrials copies changed records from ClinicalTrials.gov every night and reloads the whole registry every week. The sponsor last updated this record on 10 Nov 2016; AzTrials last refreshed its copy on 8 Nov 2026.