4 Medical Miracles that Harness the Power of Sound

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The medical field is perfecting the use of sound in many procedures, steadily leading us toward a future in which all hospitals look like the record store from A Clockwork Orange.

Performing Surgery

SOUND WAVES SKIN LAYER STRATUM CORNEUM DRUG PATHWAYS NERVE CELLS
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As it turns out, sound can cut you pretty deep (and not just with Nothing Compares 2 U). Scalpels and needles are being replaced in some surgical procedures by various ultrasound techniques, because apparently doctors are no longer getting paid enough to actually hold anything. Technology like the SonoPrep use low frequency ultrasound to temporarily liquefy skin cells to allow medications to pass through (thus eliminating the need for injections), while histotripsy uses focused ultrasound to force tissues apart with a Jay Z bass line rather than making an incision with a sterilized medical tool (the only sterilization in this process is presumably buying the edited version from Wal-Mart).

High frequency sound waves, when focused on a precise point, can also generate enough heat to suture a wound, literally fusing it shut in less than a minute and eliminating the need for stitches. It can even seal up internal injuries without burning the skin or anything in between. This is similar to that time in Star Trek when Kirk and Spock used focused sound waves to blow up a mountain, although somehow it seems less believable despite being documented fact.

Treating Chronic Afflictions

Shockwave Therapy may sound like a dubstep band under federal investigation for child pornography, but in reality it's a process used to treat tennis elbow and plantar fasciitis (heel spurs). By sending sonic pulses into your body, doctors can interrupt the pain signals coming from your nerves and increase metabolic activity, essentially tricking your body into healing itself. A variation on this treatment is also widely used to treat kidney stones - the shockwaves are sent into the body to shatter the stones like an evildoer's facebones beneath a gamma punch from the Incredible Hulk.

4 Medical Miracles that Harness the Power of Sound
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Appropriately, this treatment is administered with a space dildo.

Similarly, vibroacoustic therapy has been developed to massage deep internal areas of the body with low frequency sounds and vibrations, presumably while some doctor was watching the subwoofer orgasm scene from Private Parts. The treatment has been successful in reducing the symptoms of neurological diseases such as Parkinson's, marking the only conceivable way that Daft Punk could ever be used to make people less confused.

Fighting Infection

Biofilm is a clumped together group of bacteria that can form around medical devices implanted in the body, such as a pacemaker, and kill a person to death via horrible infection. Focused sound waves, similar to the ones that suture wounds, can be used to break up biofilms inside the body like blasting JoJo songs to clear out the stragglers at the end of a Mastodon concert. This technique is 99.99 percent effective and kills the bacteria in question in less than 30 seconds, all just by using sound and never making direct contact with the infected area. This is like if the phone call killed people in The Ring instead of the video, forgoing the seven day grace period.

Fighting Cancer

Ultrasound waves can be used to detect cancer as well as babies (which are a type of cancer). By mapping out blood vessels via ultrasound imaging, doctors can detect abnormalities that are an early warning sign of developing cancer.

Variations on high-intensity focused ultrasound (or HIFU, our cuttin' and stitchin' friend from earlier) can also treat some cancer by fragmenting tumors throughout the body. Together, the two are like a crime fighting duo (or like Nicolas Cage and Sean Connery in The Rock) - ultrasound imaging tracks the cancer down, and then HIFU swoops in to deliver a taint-splitting uppercut. None of the surrounding tissue is damaged in the process, leaving cancer the sole attendant of this sonic boot party.

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