Although sometimes applied in cryosurgery through laparoscopic or open surgical approaches, most often cryoablation is performed percutaneously (through the skin and into the target tissue containing the tumor) by a medical specialist, such as an interventional radiologist.

The area of tissue destruction created by this technique can be monitored more effectively by CT than RFA, a potential advantage when treating tumors adjacent to critical structures.

In surgical procedures, a flexible probe is used directly on an exposed heart to apply the energy that interrupts the arrhythmia.

[4] In this procedure which has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), an ultrasound-guided probe is inserted into the fibroadenoma and extremely cold temperatures are then used to destroy the abnormal cells.

A recent study[7] concluded that procedure times are slightly higher on average for cryoablation than for traditional radio-frequency (heat-based) ablations.

Techniques also exist where incisions are used in the open heart to interrupt abnormal electrical conduction (Maze procedure).

The most common heart operations in which cryosurgery may be used in this way are mitral valve repairs and coronary artery bypass grafting.

During the procedure, a flexible cryoprobe is placed on or around the heart and delivers cold energy that disables tissue responsible for conducting the arrhythmia.

[9] In-vivo cryoablation of a tumor alone can induce an immunostimulatory, systemic anti-tumor response, resulting in a cancer vaccine – the abscopal effect.

[12] Since then there have been numerous accounts of ice used for pain relief including from the Ancient Egyptians and Avicenna of Persia (AD 982–1070).

[13] Since 1899, Dr. Campbell White used refrigerants for treating a variety of conditions, including: lupus erythematosus, herpes zoster, chancroid, naevi, warts, varicose leg ulcers, carbuncles, carcinomas and epitheliomas.

Dr. Irving S. Cooper, in 1913, progressed the field of cryotherapy by designing a liquid nitrogen probe capable of achieving temperatures of -196 °C, and utilizing it to treat of Parkinson's disease and previously inoperable cancer.

Cryotherapy continued to advance with Dr. Amoils developing a liquid nitrogen probe capable of achieving cooling expansion, in 1967.

[17] For the next three decades, Dr. Tanaka successfully treated small and localized as well as advanced and unresectable breast cancer with minimally invasive cryoablation.

All of Dr. Tanaka's breast cancer cases were considered incurable: advanced, unresectable, and resistant to radiotherapy, chemotherapy, and endocrine therapy.

[17] At the same time, physicians, including Dr. Ablin and Dr. Gage, started utilizing cryoablation for the treatment of prostate and bone cancer.