AURORA, Colo. — Surgeons at UCHealth Anschutz Cancer Pavilion in Aurora are using new technology to identify cancer cells they normally would’ve missed.
Pafolacianine, also known by the brand name CYTALUX, is a molecule that binds to cancer cells and lights them up with fluorescent markers, making them glow. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved it for use in the lungs and ovaries.
Patients get an infusion hours before surgery where doctors use a robot a camera and a near-infrared light to make that fluorescent light visible.
Denver7 spoke with Dr. Robert Meguid, who specializes in surgery on the lungs, esophagus and chest wall. He said pafolacianine is effective in flagging cancers missed by CT scans and the naked eye, and it gives his team more confidence they’ve removed all cancers during a surgery.
Meguid said it’s especially helpful in patients with cancers elsewhere in the body that spread to the lungs.
“This is, to me, a really exciting time in healthcare,” Meguid told Denver7. “Because there's so many advances that are making it to patient care delivery that are improving their outcomes, to help patients be cancer free or have improved quality of life.”
Meguid said at this point, very few medical centers nationally are using pafolacianine, but that it’s gaining traction. UCHealth Anschutz Cancer Pavilion has been using it for about a year and a half, Meguid said, and it was the first medical center in Colorado to use it on adult lungs.
