ABSTRACT
Medical Technologies, now Gyrus ENT, Sunnyvale, CA) in order to maintain the target tissue temperature at a preprogrammed setting (6).
When RF energy is applied to the tongue in this way, there is necrosis of the muscle with preservation of mucosa. Powell et al. (6) showed that as energy was increased from 500 to 2400 J, the size of the treated lesion increased from 1.4 cm 0.5 cm to 1.5 cm 1.7 cm and the cross-sectional area of the lesion increased from 0.7 cm2 to 1.4 cm2 (6). After lesion creation, the initial 2.5 cm2 lesion increased to 7 cm2 after 2 days but then shrank to 1 cm2 over the next 21 days. Application of 2400 J to the tongue was estimated to cause an overall tissue volume reduction of 0.84 g of muscle tissue (6).
