EARLIER DETECTION

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. One of the most challenging aspects of the disease and its treatment is that by the time patients show symptoms, lung cancer is typically in its advanced stages — leaving patients with a poorer prognosis.Yet if it is detected early — before the cancer has spread — it is more likely to be treated successfully.The advent of low-dose CT scans for patients at high risk for lung cancer has helped identify some of these early-stage cancers.

Still, even once detected, early-stage lung cancer has been difficult to diagnose because the tissue samples need to come from hard-to-reach areas deep in the lung’s periphery. Interventional Pulmonologist, Carlos Sotelo, MD, knows the challenges well. In fact, they inspired him to bring a revolutionary robotic-assisted technology that can help detect early-stage lung cancer to Doylestown Hospital in October 2022.“The intention of the technology is to be able to cure the cancer because it’s being diagnosed early,” says Dr. Sotelo, who added he and the team have already completed 50 of the procedures.The technology allows physicians to locate, biopsy, and mark nodules for surgical resection in one procedure.

“It’s been an awesome experience,” says Pinak Acharya, MD, pulmonologist, who uses the robotic-assisted bronchoscopy. “We can get the very small nodules that normally we would just watch ... The beauty of this technology is it allows us to evaluate the lesion with less risk, better accuracy, and it’s more complete.”

Not only can the Ion help in detecting early-stage cancer but also advanced cancer (allowing the pulmonologists to stage the cancer) as well as lesions that are noncancerous.

Patients can expect the robotic-assisted bronchoscopy procedure to last less than two hours and results of the biopsy are available in a few days. “It is potentially life-changing for our patients,” says Dr. Sotelo. Doylestown Hospital is located at 595 West State Street, Doylestown, PA; 215-345-2200; www.doylestownhealth.org.