末期がん患者に両肺移植　米病院が成功

【ＡＦＰ＝時事】米シカゴの病院ノースウエスタン・メディシンは２５日、末期の肺がん患者への両肺移植が成功したと発表した。他の患者に希望を与える成果となる。（写真は米シカゴの病院ノースウェスタン・メディシンで話す、両肺移植を受けたアルバート・コーリーさん（右）と手術を担当したアンキット・バーラト医師。同病院提供）
　アルバート・コーリーさん（５４）は昨年９月２５日、同院で７時間に及ぶ移植手術を受けた。コーリーさんは非喫煙者だった。
　医療班は、コーリーさんはステージ４の肺がんを患っているものの、他の臓器には転移していないことから、両肺移植の対象になり得ると判断。２週間後に手術の運びとなった。
　移植から６か月。両肺は正常に機能し、コーリーさんの体にがん再発の兆候はない。
　同院の胸部手術部門を統括するアンキット・バーラト氏は、「ステージ４のがん患者への肺移植は全くあり得ないことと考えられているが、コーリーさんのがんは胸部に限られていたため、手術中に全てのがん細胞を取り除き、命を救えると確信していた」と説明した。
　バーラト氏は２０２０年、新型コロナウイルス感染症で肺を損傷した患者に両肺移植を行い、成功させていた。
　コーリーさんは現在、呼吸補助装置に頼ることなく仕事をしたりジムに通ったりと、普通の生活を送っている。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/03/28-09:30）

US doctors announced Thursday they had successfully performed a double lung transplant on a patient with terminal lung cancer, giving new hope to others who also are in advanced stages of the deadly disease.
Albert Khoury, a 54-year-old non-smoker, underwent a seven-hour surgery to receive his new lungs at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago on September 25, 2021.
Six months on, the lungs are working well and he has no signs of cancer in his body.
Lung transplantation for lung cancer is extremely uncommon with few cases reported, Ankit Bharat, chief of thoracic surgery at Northwestern Medicine, said in a statement.
For patients with stage 4 cancer, lung transplantation is considered a complete 'no-no,' but because Albert's cancer was confined only to his chest, we were confident we could clear all the cancer during surgery and save his life.
Surgeons are generally reluctant to proceed with such transplants because if there are even a few cancerous cells remaining, there is a strong chance they will regrow in a patient taking immune-suppressing medications to prevent organ rejection.
The few such procedures in the past have not been successful, but since then, advances have allowed doctors to better understand cancer's spread and when an intervention might work.
Khoury, who was working as a cement finisher for the city of Chicago, began to experience back pain, sneezing, chills, cough and mucus in early 2020. At first he assumed it was Covid, but called his doctor when he coughed up blood.
They discovered stage 1 lung cancer, but due to the Covid-19 surge, I couldn't begin treatment right away, he said in a statement.
By July 2020, his cancer -- invasive mucinous adenocarcinoma -- progressed to stage 2, and, despite several rounds of chemotherapy, kept growing to stage 3 and stage 4.
He was told there was no chance of survival, but his sister, who had heard about the pioneering lung transplants at Northwestern, urged him to get another opinion.
- 'Can't stop smiling' -
In 2020, Bharat had performed the first US double lung transplant on a woman in her twenties whose lungs had been decimated by Covid.
Khoury came under the care of oncologist Young Chae at Northwestern who wanted first to try other cancer-fighting treatments -- but his health kept declining, leaving him in an intensive care unit with pneumonia and sepsis.
It was determined that he was in fact a candidate for transplant since the cancer, despite being stage 4, had not spread to other organs, and he received his new lungs after a two-week wait.
The team had to remove trillions of cancer cells all over his lungs within a six hour time frame, all the while taking care not to spill material into his chest cavity or blood stream.
It was an exciting night, said Bharat.
Khoury is now leading a normal life, and is able to work and go to the gym, without requiring breathing support.
My life went from zero to 100 because of Northwestern Medicine, he said.
You didn't see this smile on my face for over a year, but now I can't stop smiling.
Based on the success, Bharat and Chae are developing a new set of protocols to determine who else might be eligible for such treatment.
We have now convinced ourselves that it's possible to offer transplant in a cancer setting... I think it's going to make a bigger impact than we appreciate right now, said Bharat.
Lung cancer is by far the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States making up almost 25 percent of all cancer mortalities -- but the number of new cases has been declining, partly because of people quitting smoking.