[Tracheobronchial tumors treated with laser. 7-year experiences at Aker hospital]

The first Nd-YAG laser treatment for endoluminal airway obstruction in Norway was performed at Aker Hospital in November 1983. During the ensuing seven years 68 patients have been treated, involving altogether 172 procedures. During the early years a flexible bronchoscope was used to guide the flexible laser probe, in later years the usual practice has been to use the rigid bronchoscope, 54 patients were treated for malignant tumour, three for semi-malignant and 11 for benign tumour. In general, the best results were achieved with a proximal location of the tumour. Two patients died during the procedure from hypoxia, and one patient died from hemoptysis on the fifth day after operation. Based on retrospective studies of the clinical journal and the results from postmortem examination of 97 consecutive patients who died from pulmonary carcinoma, we anticipated that six of these patients would have benefited from laser treatment on at least one occasion during their disease. In Norway, with an incidence of approximately 400 cases of pulmonary carcinomas each year per million inhabitants, we estimate the need of lung laser procedures to be 25 per million each year.