Manchester’s Wythenshawe Hospital has become one of the first hospitals in Europe to use an advanced new robotic tool to diagnose early-stage lung cancer.
This state-of-the-art bronchoscopy gadget enables doctors to insert a flexible catheter through a person’s mouth and into their lungs to test nodules suspected of having the disease. The difference between this tool and others on the market is its unprecedented precision and manoeuvrability.
It was developed by Intuitive Surgical, Inc. (NASDAQ: ISRG): a highly valuable company with an enterprise value of approximately US$167 billion. A minimally invasive lung biopsy is the aim of the game with this technology.
The United Kingdom’s National Health Service (NHS) explained that patients with suspected lung cancer may have to spend months of “watchful waiting” when difficult-to-reach nodules are monitored with scans but have to be permitted to grow until they are big enough for testing. However, the system created by Intuitive solves this issue by quickly and accurately reaching the most difficult places, the British healthcare provider says.
Dr Haval Balata, a respiratory physician at the Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, says the technology is game-changing. “We are diagnosing lung cancers at a much earlier stage when the lesions are very small and difficult to biopsy,” Balata described Tuesday.
Read more: Breath Diagnostics takes aim at lung cancer with One Breath
Read more: Breath Diagnostics pioneers novel lung cancer breath test
Lung cancer is UK’s top cancer killer
About 48,000 people in the country are diagnosed every year and only 13,000 of them will survive. Lung cancer accounts for about 21 per cent of all cancer deaths in the UK.
The NHS recently implemented a scheme to help improve testing rates and subsequent survival rates. Only about two-thirds of citizens who are eligible for testing bother to get checked out — a problem the health provider aims to try and solve.
Delays in diagnosing UK citizens have resulted in lower survival rates than European nations such as Denmark and Sweden.
High-speed non-invasive testing options come to light
It’s great that an expensive high-tech machine can detect early-stage lung cancer by sticking a robotic arm down a person’s throat, but what if diagnosing the disease could be simpler?
One American company, Breath Diagnostics Inc., has managed to develop a small device that can provide accurate results through a much more convenient and non-invasive means.
All they need to do is breathe into a bag that gets sent off to a lab. An accurate diagnosis is then given within a few days.
rowan@mugglehead.com
