Dr. Swanson on Treating Multifocal Lung Cancer

Scott J. Swanson, MD, co-director of Minimally Invasive Surgery and chief surgical officer at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, discusses treating multifocal lung cancer.

Scott J. Swanson, MD, co-director of Minimally Invasive Surgery and chief surgical officer at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, discusses treating multifocal lung cancer.

If a physician observes more than 1 tumor in a patient, they should not assume that it’s metastatic and that there are not many options for treatment. We now know that multifocal tumors can be treated surgically and have a beneficial outcome, explains Swanson.

Treating multifocal tumors independently might give the patient a similar outcome to a patient with only 1 tumor, states Swanson.