Isolating the Liver for an Intensive Dose of Chemotherapy

The patient, from southern California has made 3 trips to the National Institutes of Health in suburban Washington for the experimental treatment to reduce the tumor in his liver and so far it appears to be having some success. The patient has a life-threatening metastasis confined just to the liver.

The procedure is done with the use of catheters through an artery in is leg all the way up to the liver, and they are in essence blocking the normal flow of blood. It is current day technology that is allowing this type of procedure to occur, to navigate and place the catheters in the area needed.

The blood with the chemotherapy treatment gets sent outside the body and filtered to remove the chemicals and comes back to the body through the neck. Everything does not get filtered so there are some side effects afterwards, but the entire operating room for this procedure was estimated at 20k, not inexpensive by all means. The patient stated that is was easier than normal liver treatments and 2 days later he felt pretty good.

If this type of therapy works with the liver, it could stand a chance to be used with cancer of other organs as well. There’s also regenerative medicine working on growing livers with stem cells from pigs. The Oprah show and Dr. Oz did a real nice job on bringing this technology to life, already there are people walking around with bladders that have been grown in labs, so the advancement with lives would be phenomenal.

The Oprah Show – Dr. Oz Explores and Explains Regenerative Medicine

All of this, of course is going to require money and funds and hopefully we will begin to see the clinical world and science come together, and have leadership that will recognize than funding and research is needed to save lives. BD

WASHINGTON -- Bill Darker grinned as he headed into the operating room for a dramatic experiment: A super-high dose of chemotherapy dripped directly into his cancer-ridden liver, 10 times more than patients normally can tolerate.

Not to fear. Working through small puncture holes, doctors sealed off Darker's liver and washed most of the toxic medication from his blood so it didn't poison the rest of his body.

Massive chemo dose targets cancerous liver - washingtonpost.com