Treating Liver Tumors

Here’s good news for sufferers of liver diseases!

The St. Luke’s Medical Center has come up with another first with the introduction of the Radiofrequency Ablation (RFA), one of the latest technologies in the treatment of liver cancer and metastatic liver tumors, which affect two million people worldwide.

RFA is a new approach wherein a probe is inserted through the liver tissue with ultrasound guidance into the tumor and delivers heat at the site of the lesion. This heat produces coagulation or melting of the target liver tissue. As in microwave cooking, RFA works by heating from the inside out where the tumor is literally "burned out."

The procedure normally takes around 12 minutes using the Cool-tip electrode and treatment is administered in one session for tumor mass of five centimeters or smaller.

But then depending on the number of applications and the number of lesions to be treated, the procedure can take a longer period of time.

A safe and well-tolerated procedure, RFA is associated with few complications and is performed through the following: percutaneously (through the skin without an operation), laparoscopic (several small incisions), and open abdominal incision.

Dr. Juliet Gopez-Cervantes, head of the St. Luke’s Center for Liver Diseases and the country’s only liver transplant specialist with formal training today, puts it, "The decision which approach is best for each patient with malignant liver tumors is based on the number of lesions and locations of the tumors in the liver, extension or stage of the disease and condition of the remaining or uninvolved liver tissue."

The liver synthesizes most of the essential serum proteins, production of bile and regulation of nutrients, and plays a role in the detoxification of ammonia by converting it to urea.

The liver can be kept healthy if one refrains from taking too much alcohol, especially if one has a pre-existing liver disease. Occasionally, drinking is not bad for healthy individuals as long as it is in minimal amount (four ounces per week).

Other ways of taking care of the liver is to be careful with the medicines an individual is taking and preventing oneself from acquiring hepatitis, particularly viral hepatitis.

Cervantes also noted that people should be conscious of the transmission of Hepatitis B, which is still the most common predisposing factor in liver cancer.

Speaking about Hepatitis B, the most common cause of acquiring the virus is through exposure to contaminated blood. Death from Hepatitis B-related disease accounts for 40 to 50 percent for men and 15 percent for women.

Pregnant women are strongly advised to undergo viral hepatitis screening, particularly for Hepatitis B virus. Thus, a woman in the infective stage of hepatitis has a greater than 90 percent likelihood of transmitting the disease to her newborn upon birth.

The infected newborn then has a chance to develop liver cirrhosis with liver cancer 20 to 30 years later. The sad part of this is that the problem is most of the time detected at the late stage where liver disease is beyond curative treatment.

Cervantes advises people to be conscious of the transmission of viral hepatitis, particularly B and C, especially when there is blood-to-blood contact. She suggested proper sterilization by soaking instruments used in manicures and pedicures in beauty parlors, shavers of barbers and instruments from dental clinics in 70 percent alcohol for at least 30 minutes. Potential blood donors should also be thoroughly screened for viral hepatitis.

(Cervantes has been the recipient of foreign medical scholarships and the co-author of several research papers published locally and internationally. At present, she is working on DNA analysis for Hepatitis B virus and pathogenesis of Hepatocellular Carcinoma.)