Therapeutic Endoscopy

Virginia Mason Franciscan Health is the Pacific Northwest leader in therapeutic endoscopy. Recognized by the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy's National Endoscopy Unit Recognition Program for quality and safety in the practice of gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy, the center helps people seeking diagnosis and treatment of gastrointestinal, biliary, and pancreatic disorders that are not commonly seen in other centers.

Our team of specialists include GI procedure nurses, interventional radiologists, gastrointestinal surgeons, oncologists, pathologists, and radiology technicians who are specially trained in advanced therapeutic endoscopy. Recent advances in endoscope technology give our team the tools and resources to provide extraordinary care with greater efficiency, safety and precision.

Therapeutic endoscopy at Virginia Mason Franciscan Health helps people seeking diagnosis and treatment of gastrointestinal, biliary, and pancreatic disorders. The most common endoscopic procedures we perform are upper endoscopy and colonoscopy. 

Endoscopic therapy refers to the use of an endoscope—a thin flexible tube that holds a miniature camera, microscopic instruments or an ultrasound probe—to diagnose and treat GI disorders. Our gastroenterologists carefully maneuver the endoscope through the upper or lower GI tract to diagnose and treat bleeding sites, tumors, obstructions, and many other GI tract disorders.

The experienced and compassionate doctors, nurses, radiologists and pathologists at Virginia Mason Franciscan Health receive specialized training and are experts in therapeutic endoscopy. 

We are proud to offer two types of advanced endoscopy:

• Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP)
  ERCP enables your doctor to precisely evaluate and treat problems in the bile ducts and the pancreatic duct. Our skilled radiologists have specific expertise in ERCP, which involves radiologic imaging during the endoscopy.

• Endoscopic ultrasound (EUS)
  In EUS, an ultrahigh frequency ultrasound probe on the tip of the endoscope produces high-resolution internal images of the bile ducts, liver, pancreas, stomach, esophagus, and colon. This technology can also be used to take a biopsy and is helpful for lung-cancer staging.