The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 268 No 7189 p349-354
16 March 2002

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Gut Online (gut.bmjjournals.com)

Light therapy for pancreatic cancer

Photodynamic therapy could be used to treat patients with pancreatic cancer, suggest researchers. They gave intravenous meso-tetrahydroxyphenylchlorin (a photosensitising agent) to 16 patients with inoperable pancreatic cancer. Three days later the researchers inserted needles carrying laser fibres that delivered light through the skin and directly into the tumour. They found that treatment shrank the area of viable tumour (Gut 2002;50:549).