Doctors in China have shrunk a large lung tumour in an unborn baby without open surgery. It is described as the first successful use of microwave ablation to treat congenital pulmonary airway malformation (CPAM), a rare inborn lung defect.
According to a report in the journal Ultrasound in Obstetrics & Gynecology, an ultrasound scan of a 40-year-old woman at 22 weeks of pregnancy found an abnormal mass of about 5 cm in the baby's lung. It was growing fast and pressing on the baby's heart and lungs, and fluid was building up dangerously in the baby's abdomen.
CPAM occurs in roughly one in 25,000 to 35,000 pregnancies. Most cases cause no serious trouble, but in some the tissue grows quickly and can threaten the baby's life in the womb. There is no single treatment for all patients: mothers are sometimes given steroids, large fluid-filled cysts can be drained with a tube placed through a needle, and in severe cases the affected part of the fetal lung is removed surgically. Each carries risk.
This time the doctors passed a fine needle through the mother's abdomen directly into the abnormal lung tissue and applied microwave energy through it. Water molecules in the tissue vibrate rapidly and heat up, and the heat destroys the abnormal tissue. Within three days the tumour had shrunk markedly and the fluid in the baby's abdomen had cleared. The baby was delivered by caesarean section at 37 weeks, weighing about 2.9 kg.
The Chinese doctors call it a 'new milestone' in medicine. But the method has so far been used on only one patient, and they say more research and trials on more patients are needed to establish its safety and effectiveness. The report is from Ittefaq.
Source: Ittefaq
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