Treatment options for
gastrointestinal (GI) cancer depend on each patient’s type and stage of cancer,
as well as the patient’s age, overall health, and preferences. At the Harold C.
Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center at UT Southwestern Medical Center, we offer
every GI cancer therapy available.
Medical
Treatment
Medical treatment for GI cancer varies,
depending on the cancer. Some therapies are designed to kill cancer cells;
others aim to stop the cancer cells from growing, attack their abnormalities,
or decrease the chance of them returning.
The medical oncologists who treat
gastrointestinal cancer at UT Southwestern are subspecialized, which means
they focus specifically on treating GI cancers. They work with a
multidisciplinary team of other subspecialists, including surgical oncologists
and radiation oncologists, to determine the best treatment plan for each
patient.
Access to New Treatments
When patients receive care at
UT Southwestern, they have access to the latest medical treatments. As an
academic medical center and the only cancer center in North Texas designated by
the National Cancer Institute, we can offer new treatments for GI cancers as
soon as they’re available or at their earliest stages of development, before
they become available at other medical centers.
For example, when the drug
regorafenib (commercial name Stivarga®) was being evaluated in
clinical trials for the treatment of colon cancer, UT Southwestern was,
for a long while, the only site in Texas where the drug was available. This
drug is now approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for some
patients with colon cancer and advanced GI stromal tumors that cannot be
surgically removed and no longer respond to other FDA-approved treatments.
Chemotherapy and Targeted Therapy
Depending on the type of GI cancer
and the patient, we sometimes use medical treatments to shrink the cancer
before an operation (called neoadjuvant therapy). This approach can make
surgery an option for patients with otherwise inoperable tumors, and it can
make an operation safer and more effective. We might also use treatments after
surgery if the cancer has spread to the lymph nodes or to relieve symptoms of
GI cancer that has spread to other areas of the body.
Medical treatments for GI cancer
include:
- Chemotherapy: Our medical
oncologists use drugs to destroy cancer cells,
which work by stopping their ability to grow and divide.
- Targeted
therapy: Our
oncologists use drugs that target the cancer’s
specific genes or proteins or the tissue environment that contributes to cancer
growth and survival. This type of treatment, which is not appropriate for
everyone, blocks the growth and spread of cancer cells while limiting damage to
healthy cells.
Surgery
for Gastrointestinal Cancer
Surgical treatment of GI cancer
is a necessary part of treatment for patients who have a chance to be cured.
Choosing a surgeon who specializes in these complex operations is critical to
allow for a quicker recovery, offer the best chance for removing all of the
tumor, and provide coordinated care for any other needed treatment.
Many different surgeries treat
the different types of GI cancer. The surgical oncologists at the Simmons
Cancer Center are highly trained and experienced in performing the most
appropriate surgery for patients and their specific GI cancer.
Our multidisciplinary approach to
GI cancer care means that before patients receive any treatment, our surgeons
collaborate with medical oncologists, radiation oncologists, endoscopists,
radiologists, and pathologists, all of whom specialize in GI cancer.
Surgery for gastrointestinal
cancer might be done with the traditional open procedure or, for some patients,
a minimally invasive laparoscopic or robotic procedure.
Minimally invasive procedures generally have quicker recovery times
compared with open surgery. This advantage means patients can get back to
normal activities faster or move on to the next step in their treatment plan
sooner.
Our team includes some of the
most experienced minimally invasive GI cancer surgeons in Dallas-Ft. Worth.
Having a surgeon who specializes and has experience in the exact type of
procedure needed is important – it can directly affect outcomes and make a
difference in care.
In addition, UT Southwestern
offers hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC), a unique
chemotherapy procedure administered by a surgical oncologist for the treatment
of some GI cancers, such as those that originate from or spread to the
peritoneum, the membrane that lines the walls of the abdomen. HIPEC delivers
heated chemotherapy directly into the abdominal cavity, where it penetrates the
diseased tissue directly, after all of the known tumors have been removed.
Radiation
Therapy for Gastrointestinal Cancer
Radiotherapy is used in the
treatment of many GI cancers. For anal cancer in particular, it is often the
main form of therapy, in combination with chemotherapy.
UT Southwestern physicians
are world leaders in the development of a newer form of radiation delivery
called stereotactic ablative radiotherapy
(SABR, also known as stereotactic body radiation therapy, or SBRT). We have
successfully tested a high-dose, single-treatment SABR procedure for liver
cancer, demonstrating its safety and efficacy. With SABR treatment, the
radiation beam is delivered from many different angles, sparing healthy tissue
from excessive radiation while delivering a highly potent dose to the tumor
target.
