Lee Health turns to robotics to help treat liver cancer

Health care system: Lee Health

Size: 1,899 beds through seven hospitals (four acute care, two rehabilitation facilities and one children's hospital.) More than 2 million per year patient contacts per year. 

Budget: $2.89 billion operating revenue (fiscal 2023) 

Technology: The Edison System

Late last year, Lee Health introduced a new treatment to help those dealing with liver cancer.

Several patients received it at the time — September — and doctors at the health system were optimistic they’d found a treatment that was “a game-changer for many liver cancer patients.”

The technology is called histotripsy and, according to Lee Health, it is administered through the Edison System, which “targets the tumor with quick, powerful ultrasound pulses under the guidance of a robotic arm.”

According to the American Cancer Society, histotripsy is an ablation treatment. That is a technique used by doctors to treat people with small liver tumors when surgery is not a good option.

What histotripsy does, the nonprofit cancer group says, is use sound waves to break down a tumor's tissues and turn it into liquid.

“Unlike other types of ablation,” says the American Cancer Society, “histotripsy does not require anything to be inserted into the body. It works by directly damaging the tumor's tissue, which helps protect the healthy tissue and cells around the tumor.”

Lee Health says the standard treatment for liver cancer traditionally has been chemotherapy or surgery when possible. Histotripsy, however, gives patients an additional option, especially those who cannot undergo surgery. In some cases, it can be performed immediately after chemotherapy.

Dr. Mark Bloomston, a Lee Health surgical oncologist, says in statement that histotripsy complements chemotherapy and allows doctors to precisely target a tumor while preserving healthy blood vessels.

Most patients, he says, can complete the treatment in a single session and, given that it’s noninvasive, many can return home the same day.

Minnesota-based HistoSonics manufactures the Edison System, winning FDA approval for it in 2023.

According to the company, the Edison System uses proprietary technology and advanced imaging to "deliver treatments with precision and control."

The new robotic technology joins several other advanced robotic systems at Lee Health, including the da Vinci Xi and da Vinci SP Surgical System for minimally invasive surgeries and the ExcelsiusGPS used in spine surgery.

Histotripsy is available at Lee Health’s Gulf Coast Medical Center. And while it is currently only approved for the treatment of liver cancer, the health system hopes that one day it will be used to treat other cancers, including pancreatic kidney cancer.

— Louis Llovio