Earlier this year, we wrote “In Memory of Nightbirde – An Amazing Person.” Liver cancer contributed to her passing. Thankfully, there is now a new liver cancer treatment. With VERY promising results.
Chemosaturation Therapy: A New Liver Cancer Treatment
As reported by Ben Mitchell for the UK’s Independent:
A new treatment for liver cancer isolates the organ and “bathes” it in chemotherapy. With positive effects in almost 90% of patients.
in the UK, we see the procedure being pioneered at University Hospital Southampton. And it involves using two small balloons to divert blood past the liver for an hour. While simultaneously delivering drugs directly into the organ.
Known as chemosaturation therapy or percutaneous hepatic perfusion (PHP). The technique allows doctors to administer much larger doses of drug than patients would receive with standard chemotherapy. Because it does not enter the bloodstream and cause unnecessary damage to healthy parts of the body.
After delivering the drug, blood from the liver gets drained from the patient. Then, processed through a filtration machine to reduce toxicity. Before being returned to the patient via the jugular vein.
Consultant interventional radiologist Dr. Brian Stedman said his team had performed 300 procedures in 100 patients. Their form of eye cancer (ocular melanoma) had spread to the liver, called liver metastases.
In a study published in the journal Melanoma Research, the team found liver cancers got controlled in 88.9% of patients who received chemosaturation therapy. With 62% of them surviving for a year. And 30% after two years.
The following figure highlights the steps in the treatment process.
