Other Types of Endoscopy
An endoscope that examines the small bowel, with a user-controlled push/rotate feature that creates a corkscrew motion to push the instrument through the 20-foot-long small bowel.
A micro-camera housed in a capsule, once swallowed, relays images of your esophagus, stomach and small intestine to your doctor as it passes through the gastrointestinal tract.
Two tests in one, endoscopy and X-rays, locates and treats problems in your bile ducts, pancreas and gallbladder.
Did You Know About Endoscopy and the Sword Swallower?
The modern endoscope dates to the 1800s, when German doctor Philip Bozzini created a Lichtleiter, or “light conductor,” to view internal organs through a tube and assorted attachments. How did a doctor actually see inside the body? With a candle and angled mirrors.
The first use of the word endoscope, however, is credited to French doctor Antonin Jean Desomeaux and his 1853 invention, a Lichtleiter variant with improved lighting – a lamp that used a burning mixture of alcohol and turpentine.
Yet another doctor, Adolph Kussmaul of Germany, was the first to use that instrument, with modifications, to look inside the stomach. Most notable was his “safe” test subject – a sword swallower who had no trouble swallowing the tube that measured 18.5 inches long and almost a half-inch in diameter. (Fortunately, the tubes now are both flexible and much smaller in diameter.)