Promising research areas include safely opening the blood-brain barrier to enable more precise drug delivery, enhancing cancer immunotherapy by priming tumors to become more responsive to immunotherapy.
In April, Providence Swedish was part of a major medical milestone in medicine: more than one million patients worldwide have now been treated with focused ultrasound, a noninvasive technology that focuses multiple beams of ultrasound energy precisely and accurately on targets deep in the brain without damaging surrounding normal tissue. Focused ultrasound is used to treat more than 70 conditions, including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, essential tremor, uterine fibroids, and tumors of the brain, pancreas, prostate, kidneys, breast, and liver.
Providence Swedish is home to one of the country’s best focused ultrasound programs and is the only program in Washington State treating essential tremor, a non-fatal neurological condition that affects some 10 million people. In fact, Swedish was in the forefront of the development of focused ultrasound and was home to a 2013 clinical trial that helped expand the technology’s use for the condition. Support from the Swedish Foundation also played an integral role in bringing the technology to Swedish.
Neurosurgeon Tony Wang, M.D., leads Providence Swedish’s focused ultrasound program treating patients with essential tremor. It’s the only one of its kind in Washington State. While ultrasound has a long history in neurosurgery, it wasn’t until the early 2000s that there were developments in its physics that allowed physicians to deliver ultrasounds through the skull.
“I think being healthy means being able to do the things you want to do in life without pain, disability or difficulty,” says Dr. Wang. His work has helped scores of patients do just that.
Neurosurgeon Stephen Monteith, M.D., was among the physicians who broadened focused ultrasound’s use to the treatment of essential tremor, marking a significant advance for the technology and garnering public notice, including a segment on CBS’s “60 Minutes”.
“It was also published in the New England Journal of Medicine and then it just really kind of took off,” says Dr. Monteith. “And then there was work on using focused ultrasound for all these other applications, including treating fibroids and prostate disease.”
“There is basically nowhere in the Northwest that has the same level of experience as we {have at Providence Swedish],” adds Dr. Monteith.
According to the Focused Ultrasound Foundation over 150,000 patients received focused ultrasound treatment in 2024 alone, and new clinical trials advanced its potential in the treatment of glioblastoma, psychiatric conditions, chronic pain, and more. Uterine fibroids remain the most treated condition, with nearly 379,000 patients receiving care across 535 sites worldwide. Liver tumors rank second, with over 175,000 patients treated at 122 sites. Additionally, approximately 23,000 patients with movement disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease-related tremor.
Promising research areas include safely opening the blood-brain barrier to enable more precise drug delivery, enhancing cancer immunotherapy by priming tumors to become more responsive to immunotherapy.
Swedish was the right home for the development of this groundbreaking technology, says Dr. Monteith.
“We were innovative before, you know, everyone else was. Now there is widespread adoption of new technologies, but initially it wasn't like that,” says Dr. Monteith. “This is really a testament to Swedish’s vision and [the generosity] of donors to the Swedish Foundation. It takes some risk and some vision to do these moonshot projects.”
About Providence Swedish
Providence Swedish has served the Puget Sound region since the first Providence hospital opened in Seattle in 1877 and the first Swedish hospital opened in 1910. The two organizations affiliated in 2012 and today comprise the largest health care delivery system in Western Washington, with 22,000 caregivers, eight hospitals and 244 clinics throughout Western Washington – from Everett to Centralia. A not-for-profit family of organizations, Providence Swedish provides more than $545 million in community benefit in the Puget Sound region each year. The health system offers a comprehensive range of services and specialty and subspecialty care in a number of clinical areas, including cancer, cardiovascular health, neurosciences, orthopedics, digestive health and women’s and children’s care.
