Lung Cancer
The Lung Cancer Center at Roswell Park Cancer Institute
The multidisciplinary team at the Lung Cancer Center at Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI) offers state-of-the-art comprehensive care for all types and stages of lung cancer. Patients have access to the latest technology and approaches for prevention, diagnosis and treatment as well as research protocols.
Because lung cancer occurs in a vital life support organ that may have reduced reserve capacity from smoking, the cancer specialists at Roswell consider how much lung capacity can be safely eliminated along with the tumor. The Roswell team relies on detailed lung performance tests, carefully searches for signs of tumor spread, and finally recommends standard or new treatments that are being monitored in a clinical trial. For lung cancer newer methods are considered to be the best patient choice because many standard therapies (other than surgery for early disease) have had only limited success.
RPCI, joined by lung cancer experts representing 11 leading research institutions, established an international lung cancer registry – the Stacey Scott Lung Cancer Registry. The goal of this global collaboration is to deepen the understanding of lung cancer at its earliest, most treatable stages.
With the knowledge gleaned through this registry, we will be able to intervene with high-risk patients before they develop clinically evident lung cancer. A system of shared information through a patient registry concentrated in one database will facilitate research into the characteristics and progression of lung cancer. Alex A. Adjei, MD, PhD
Each year there are promising new drugs and other methods devised to treat this disease, but presently the best way to cure lung cancer is to detect it early and remove it with an operation. For the many patients in whom it is not found early, we attempt to control the disease with other methods like radiation and chemotherapy. Surgery may be appropriate later to remove what is left.
Offered by RPCI for many years, the LIFE (Laser-Induced Fluorescence Endoscopy) imaging system is an FDA-approved technique, that uses a computer-assisted bronchoscope to detect lung cancers in the chest. Studies demonstrate that the LIFE system actually doubles the physician's ability to see a tiny surface cancer in the airway.
