This month North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust (NCIC) saw the very first medical Thoracoscopy patient at the Cumberland Infirmary.
The Respiratory and Endoscopy teams have worked together to establish the service at NCIC, which means patients no longer have to travel to Newcastle for the procedure. This will reduce overall waiting times to confirm a diagnosis.
Maria Parsonage, Respiratory Consultant Nurse & Pleural Disease Specialist, said:
“Introducing the Thoracoscopy service means we are enhancing care that can be delivered locally in north Cumbria, rather than travelling to Newcastle. Patients no longer having to travel for their procedure can also speed up time-critical investigations, including lung and other types of cancer. Thoracoscopies provide direct visual inspection of the lining of the lung and allow targeted biopsies to be taken. This means that we can refer to patients for early treatment of cancer, if proven on the biopsy, and improve symptoms of breathlessness.
“We plan to undertake around four procedures a month at the Endoscopy Unit at Cumberland Infirmary. The first procedure that took place meant the patient was diagnosed within 48 hours with a particularly aggressive type of lung cancer, where the timing of the treatment is crucial.
“I am immensely proud of the whole team. My advice to others is to never give up on your ambition for transforming patient care when developing new services.”
A Thoracoscopy is a minimally invasive procedure, performed under local anaesthetic and conscious sedation, which allows us to look inside the lining of the lung using a thin scope, allowing us to drain off fluid and take biopsies of the pleura (lining of the lung). This procedure can be used for both diagnostic and therapeutic reasons, when investigating a pleural effusion (fluid in the lining of the lung) in suspected cancer cases.