Therasphere
Liver cancer is becoming more common as more people have Hepatitis C, which puts them at risk. The cancer typically kills within months.
Tiny glass beads are helping some live longer.
John Jambrosic had a cancerous tumor in his liver and was given three months to live.
"They said well, if we treat 'em we might be able to give you a year. You know, wow, I'm not gonna be able to get much done in a year," John said.
John had a special treatment last June. At the University of Kansas Hospital, a team injects millions of glass beads into the liver. The beads, called theraspheres are so tiny that each is just half the diameter of a human hair. The team goes through a long safety checklist because the beads contain powerful radiation.
"If you have a spill, those beads they're gonna bounce, and you're gonna have a radiation spill," radiologist Dr. Phil Johnson said.
The beads travel into a catheter that carries them into the liver, directly into the tumor.
"So the advantage of delivering those beads is they can deliver an internal radiation that's very, very focal, is limited to the tumor and spares significant damage to the liver," Dr. Johnson said.
The procedure is done on an outpatient basis and the patient is awake, though sedated.
"A couple of days after that, it really started killing the tumor and it really started to hurt for six-seven days," John said.
But it was working. The levels of a marker for cancer in his blood have dropped dramatically, and the tumor has shrunk. It's not a cure, but John could get therasphere treatment again.
"If we can get his tumor to shrink down enough, we may potentially be able to get him a transplant," Dr. Johnson said.
John has lived almost a year since diagnosis, much longer than the norm with advanced liver cancer.
John was treated at the University of Kansas Hospital, but the glass beads were actually invented at the University of Missouri.
Meryl Lin McKean, FOX 4 News
Tiny glass beads are helping some live longer.
John Jambrosic had a cancerous tumor in his liver and was given three months to live.
"They said well, if we treat 'em we might be able to give you a year. You know, wow, I'm not gonna be able to get much done in a year," John said.
John had a special treatment last June. At the University of Kansas Hospital, a team injects millions of glass beads into the liver. The beads, called theraspheres are so tiny that each is just half the diameter of a human hair. The team goes through a long safety checklist because the beads contain powerful radiation.
"If you have a spill, those beads they're gonna bounce, and you're gonna have a radiation spill," radiologist Dr. Phil Johnson said.
The beads travel into a catheter that carries them into the liver, directly into the tumor.
"So the advantage of delivering those beads is they can deliver an internal radiation that's very, very focal, is limited to the tumor and spares significant damage to the liver," Dr. Johnson said.
The procedure is done on an outpatient basis and the patient is awake, though sedated.
"A couple of days after that, it really started killing the tumor and it really started to hurt for six-seven days," John said.
But it was working. The levels of a marker for cancer in his blood have dropped dramatically, and the tumor has shrunk. It's not a cure, but John could get therasphere treatment again.
"If we can get his tumor to shrink down enough, we may potentially be able to get him a transplant," Dr. Johnson said.
John has lived almost a year since diagnosis, much longer than the norm with advanced liver cancer.
John was treated at the University of Kansas Hospital, but the glass beads were actually invented at the University of Missouri.
Meryl Lin McKean, FOX 4 News
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