The treatment of pancreatic cancer is among the most difficult challenges in cancer care. Pancreatic cancer patients must have access to all cancer related support services in order to achieve the best outcomes. The VPCI team includes, in addition to physicians and surgeons, a nurse coordinator, oncology dietician, social worker, integrative medicine practitioners and cancer rehabilitation.
Surgery
Pancreatic surgery is complex and is the mainstay of pancreatic cancer care. The outcomes of pancreatic surgery are best when performed by experienced surgeons in hospitals with comprehensive support services. Abbott Northwestern Hospital's Virginia Piper Cancer Institute is a high volume center for pancreatic resection with a complete array of support staff to optimize care before, during and after surgery.
Our pancreatic surgery team performs all types of open and laparoscopic pancreatic resections. Our outcomes with pancreaticoduodenectomy (Whipple operation) are excellent with an average hospital length of stay of 8 days, median blood transfusion and ICU stay of zero.
We are dedicated to basic and clinical research in pancreatic cancer. Nearly 100 percent of our surgical patients are enrolled in clinical trials designed to improve pancreatic cancer care.
Chemotherapy
Systemic chemotherapy is given with a goal of preventing the spread of cancer after surgery (also called adjuvant therapy) or as a primary treatment for metastatic disease.
Standard chemotherapy protocols have been well studied for safety and effect and are the mainstay of treatment. Chemotherapy can also be given on clinical trial.
Phase I studies are for new agents for which the safety and effectiveness are not known.
Phase II studies test the safety and effectiveness of new drugs.
Phase III trials are large studies testing new treatments against standard therapy.
Chemotherapy can also be given with radiation in order to improve the effectiveness of the radiation (radiation sensitizing chemotherapy) and/or to ensure treatment of the whole body (systemic).
Radiation
Radiation therapy treats localized (not metastatic) disease with a variety of potential goals including reducing the tumor size before surgery (neo-adjuvant), slowing tumor growth and spread, or controlling symptoms. Our radiation oncologists have the most advanced radiation therapy devices and highly skilled technical staff. Together they provide state of the art care, including intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) and stereotactic radiosurgery.
Combination Therapy
Our pancreatic cancer team works together very closely in order to accurately understand the stage of each patient's cancer and to develop a treatment plan. For patients with locally advanced cancers (not metastatic but not feasible for surgery because of local blood vessel invasion) we employ a combination of chemotherapy and radiation with a goal of making surgery possible. This approach requires the careful attention to nutrition, symptoms and treatment response that is provided by our multidisciplinary team approach.
Virginia Piper Cancer Institute
Abbott Northwestern Hospital
800 E. 28th St. Minneapolis, MN 55407
612-863-4633
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