August 20, 2014 — MRI Interventions Inc. announced that neurosurgeons at UC San Diego Health System have utilized the ClearPoint system's platform capabilities to facilitate three same-setting MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)-guided neurosurgical procedures for a single patient. The team, led by Clark C. Chen, M.D., Ph.D., vice chairman of academic affairs for the division of neurosurgery at UC San Diego School of Medicine, biopsied a patient's brain tumor, aspirated a fluid-filled section of the tumor and ablated the tumor, all under real-time MRI guidance enabled by the ClearPoint system in the hospital's diagnostic MRI suite.
Utilizing conventional techniques, the three surgeries likely would have been split between two or three different settings and required the patient to be moved between the neuro OR and diagnostic MRI suite. The ClearPoint system, however, enables placement of multiple devices along the same trajectory, as well as facilitates intraoperative adjustments with real-time visual verification to accommodate multiple trajectories as necessary, all within a hospital's standard diagnostic MRI scanner.
MRI Interventions business development manager and clinical engineer Geoffrey Bates attended the surgery. "We were very happy to see the ClearPoint system's platform capabilities being utilized in a single case," said Bates. "UC San Diego took a set of procedures that would ordinarily be performed over multiple days and multiple rooms and condensed them into the same setting. That means fewer hospital visits for the patient and more efficient scheduling and workflow for the surgical team."
Using the ClearPoint system for the biopsy, Chen was able to see and select the tumor at its location within the brain, establish the desired trajectory to the tumor with MRI Interventions' SmartFrame targeting device and visualize the biopsy needle as it was inserted into the desired region of the tumor, confirming with real-time MRI that the sample was removed from the targeted location. Next, Chen was able to adjust the trajectory in order to aspirate a fluid-filled section of the tumor, monitoring the tumor's changing size and shape under MRI guidance as the fluid was removed. He then utilized the ClearPoint system to target the reduced tumor, visualize the placement of a laser catheter as he inserted it into the tumor and confirm placement of the catheter at the desired location for ablation. Finally, when intraprocedural MRI showed a portion of the tumor was irregularly shaped, he was able to once more adjust the SmartFrame targeting device to reposition the catheter so that he could ablate the final segment of the tumor.
The ClearPoint system is the only technology to enable minimally invasive neurosurgery under continuous MRI guidance. In addition to brain biopsy and the placement of shunts and laser ablation catheters, the ClearPoint system is also being utilized to place electrodes in the brain.
For more information: www.mriinterventions.com
March 17, 2026 
