The purpose of the present invention is to provide a balloon catheter of novel configuration, capable of both efficiently heating a heating element by using laser light and of ensuring durability by avoiding the laser light directly heating members other than the heating element. Provided is a balloon catheter (10) with a balloon (14) disposed in the front end section of a shaft (12) and wherein: a tightly-wound coil-shaped heating element (48) is housed and arranged in the balloon (14); an optical fiber (42) that irradiates laser light inside the heating element (48) is disposed; and a supply path (28) that supplies liquid to inside the balloon (14) through the inside of the heating element (48) and a discharge path (34) that discharges the liquid from inside the balloon (14) through a discharge port positioned on the outside of the heating element (48) are disposed.
