New Procedure Only at Porter Health System Offers New Hope for Patients with Liver Cancer

Porter is the only hospital in Northwest Indiana to offer a new treatment option for patients with inoperable liver cancer, the Selective Internal Radiation Therapy (SIRT) procedure.


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Valparaiso Campus
814 LaPorte Avenue
Valparaiso, IN 46383
Phone: 219-263-4600

This new minimally invasive, outpatient procedure uses SIR-Spheres microspheres to target liver tumors in patients with metastatic liver cancer that originated in the colon or rectum.

SIRT is only suitable for patients who have liver tumors where the liver is the only site or the major site of disease,” said Amjad Alkadri, MD, an interventional radiologist on Porter’s medical staff who performs the procedure. “Before SIRT can be offered as a treatment option for patients, there are a number of factors that have to be considered. Most importantly, you need to have a sufficiently healthy liver that is working satisfactorily, usually determined by a simple blood test,” continued Alkadri.

Used in an effort to control the advancement of liver cancer, SIRT is considered a safer and more effective way of using radiation. Often used in conjunction with chemotherapy, data shows the microspheres therapy improves quality of life, provides greater periods without tumor activity, increases life expectancy, and may shrink liver tumors more than chemotherapy alone.

According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 150,000 Americans are diagnosed with colorectal cancer every year, with 60 percent seeing it spread to their liver where most tumors cannot be surgically removed.

For more information regarding the new SIRT procedure, go to www.porterhealth.comSIRT.