‘Access to cancer care matters': Physicians discuss advancements in cancer care and technology

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26-04-2025

SPRINGFIELD — Cancer treatment has come a long way from a time when women faced the choice of either dying of untreated breast cancer or undergoing disfiguring mastectomies. Doctors can now place a tiny magnetic seed ( known as a Magseed) in a woman's breast to point them to suspicious tissue.
'It's extraordinarily evolutionary,' said Dr. Sarah McPartland, a general surgeon at Trinity Health of New England in Springfield who has clinical interests in women's health.
Dying of breast cancer used to be 'shameful,' and options were limited, McPartland explained at an event on April 17 to discuss advancements in cancer care.
McPartland was among four physicians from both Mercy Medical Center and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, who spoke on the panel, which was held at the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield.
Prior to new research and technology, the most commonly used method to remove cancer cells from breasts was known as the Halsted mastectomy, which removed 'everything that cancer could touch,' including a woman's breasts, chest muscles and armpit lymph nodes, said McPartland.
It was the standard practice to follow the Halsted mastectomy, McPartland said, but there were problems: It required skin grafting from other parts of the body and caused swelling and intense chronic pain for patients.
'It was a 'choice' between loss of limb or loss of life,' she said. It wasn't until the 1980s and 1990s when a woman with a breast cancer diagnosis could hear about their diagnosis and procedure before going under the knife, she said.
Dr. Laki Rousou, a thoracic surgeon at Mercy Medical Center and one of the panelists, described his overarching goal of bringing 'care you expect in a Boston or a New York to Springfield.'
Rousou, who grew up in Western Massachusetts, completed his 1,000th robotic cardiothoracic surgery using the da Vinci Xi surgical system in May 2024.
'When you're trying to expand access, it's often a moving target,' he said, noting that many people who live in this part of the state are often unable to get to Boston or New York for care.
Rousou predominantly treats lung cancer.
Between 2016 and 2020 in Massachusetts, close to 15,000 people died from lung cancer, the cancer with the highest mortality rate during that time period, according to data from the state Department of Public Health.
'We usually find it at Stage III or IV — and it's hard to treat at that stage," he said.
Rousou and his team have since brought a technology called Illumisite, which diagnoses and finds tumorous cells in the lungs. Mercy Medical Center is the first hospital to get this technology in Western Massachusetts, and among of the first to get the technology in the country.
Since crossing the 1,000 surgery mark last year, Rousou has performed 300 more cardiothoracic surgeries using the da Vinci Xi robot, he said Thursday.
Surgeons are fully in control of the robot during surgery, allowing it to precisely suture patients back up. Eighty percent of the operations he has performed are to remove cancer, he said.
'It's a remarkable technology that gets patients to leave the hospital and get back to their lives sooner,' he said. 'Cancer outcomes are better with minimally invasive surgery.'
Rousou also developed a lung cancer screening program at Mercy Medical, which was approved by Medicare a decade ago. The screening program allows for early detection.
'Smoking cessation is the primary prevention,' he said, but screening is second.
Since starting the program, the hospital has screened close to 5,000 patients, and it positively identified 251 people with lung cancer.
'Previously, a majority of our patients were Stage III and IV, but now they are mainly Stage I and II,' he said.
Dr. Christopher Lathan, the chief clinical access and equity officer at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, spoke about how he and his team pioneered a bridge between cancer treatment facilities and marginalized communities.
Lathan, who is originally from Springfield, specializes in lung cancer. He said he wants to improve health outcomes for communities with medical mistrust.
'Cancer is the second-leading cause of death in the U.S.,' he said, and 'significant disparities exist.'
Recent federal cuts to National Institute of Health grants for cancer research threaten the future of advancements in cancer care technology, Lathan said.
'As you attack science, there are consequences,' he said. 'How do people trust what's going on?'
Lathan said that doctors in cancer care often work around their own schedules, not a patient's schedule, which often is harmful to the patient.
Factors like accessibility, fears, stigma or lack of trust can leave a person not wanting to follow up on a diagnosis, he said.
'Access to cancer care matters, and the need for relevant, impactful, inclusive, high-quality care for underserved populations who have historically been marginalized is imperative,' he said. 'It's not a zero-sum game.'
Part of the work he has done while at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, is to implement a program that is community-focused.
'We actively and proactively engage with marginalized communities,' he said, explaining that members of his team are familiar with the communities they spend time in, like Dorchester, Mattapan and Roxbury — neighborhoods in Boston — and go there often to build trust.
Since rolling out this program, Lathan said he's seen over 1,000 patients, and there has been a decrease in no-show patients, but an increase in referrals and new patient diagnostics, he said.
'Being present in the community has brought our diagnosis timeline down from 32 days to 12 days,' he said.
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Read the original article on MassLive.
Read the original article on MassLive.