Radium and the therapeutic roentgenray have given good results, but not such as would warrant their exclusive use in any case of malignancy in the larynx operable by laryngofissure. With inoperable cases, excellent palliative results are obtained. In some cases an almost complete disappearance of the growth has occurred, but ultimately there has been recurrence. The method of application of the radium, dosage, and its screening, are best determined by the radiologist in consultation with the laryngologist. Radium may be applied externally to the neck, or suspended in the larynx; radium-containing needles may be buried in the growth, or the emanations, imprisoned in glass pearls or capillary tubes, may be inserted deeply into the growth by means of a small trocar and cannula. For all of these procedures direct laryngoscopy affords a ready means of accurate application. Tracheotomy is necessary however, because of the reactionary swelling, which may be so great as to close completely the narrowed glottic chink. Where this is the case, the endolaryngeal application of the radium may be made by inserting the container through the tracheotomic wound, and anchoring it to the cannula.
The author is much impressed with Freer's method of radiation from the pyriform sinus in such cases as those in which external radiation alone is deemed insufficient.
The work of Drs. D. Bryson Delavan and Douglass M. Quick forms one of the most important contributions to the subject of the treatment of radium by cancer. (See Proceedings of the American Laryngological Association, 1922; also Proceedings of the Tenth International Otological Congress, Paris, 1922.)
[214] CHAPTER XXVI—BRONCHOSCOPY IN MALIGNANT GROWTHS OF THE TRACHEA
The trachea is often secondarily invaded by malignancy of the esophagus, thyroid gland, peritracheal or peribronchial glands. Primary malignant neoplasms of the trachea or bronchus have not infrequently been diagnosticated by bronchoscopy. Peritracheal or peribronchial malignancy may produce a compressive stenosis covered with normal mucosa. Endoscopically, the wall is seen to bulge in from one side causing a crescentic picture, or compression of opposite walls may cause a "scabbard" or pear shaped lumen. Endotracheal and endobronchial malignancy ulcerate early, and are characterized by the bronchoscopic view of a bleeding mass of fungating tissue bathed in pus and secretion, usually foul. The diagnosis in these cases rests upon the exclusion of lues, and is rendered certain by the removal of a specimen for biopsy. Sarcoma and carcinoma of the thyroid when perforating the trachea may become pedunculated. In such cases aberrant non-pathologic thyroid must be excluded by biopsy. Endothelioma of the trachea or bronchus may also assume a pedunculated form, but is more often sessile.
Treatment.—Pedunculated malignant growths are readily removed with snare or punch forceps. Cure has resulted in one case of the author following bronchoscopic removal of an endothelioma from the bronchus; and a limited carcinoma of the bronchus has been reported cured by bronchoscopic removal, with cauterization of the base. Most of the cases, however, will be subjects for palliative tracheotomy and radium therapy. It will be found necessary in many of the cases to employ the author's long, cane-shaped tracheal cannula (Fig. 104, A), in order to pipe the air down to one or both bronchi past the projecting neoplasm.
It has recently been demonstrated that following the intravenous injection of a suspension of the insoluble salt, radium sulphate, that the suspended particles are held in the capillaries of the lung for a period of one year. Intravenous injections of a watery suspension, and endobronchial injections of a suspension of radium sulphate in oil, have had definite beneficial action. While as yet, no relatively permanent cures of pulmonary malignancy have been obtained, the amelioration and steady improvement noted in the technic of radium therapy are so encouraging that every inoperable case should be thus treated, if the disease is not in a hopelessly advanced stage.
In a case under the care of Dr. Robert M. Lukens at the Bronchoscopic Clinic, a primary epithelioma of the trachea was retarded for 2 years by the use of radium applied by Dr. William S. Newcomet, radium-therapist, and Miss Katherine E. Schaeffer, technician.
[216] CHAPTER XXVII—MALIGNANT DISEASE OF THE ESOPHAGUS
Cancer of the esophagus is a more prevalent disease than is commonly thought. In the male it usually develops during the fourth and fifth decades of life. There is in some cases the history of years of more or less habitual consumption of strong alcoholic liquors. In the female the condition often occurs at an earlier age than in the male, and tends to run a more protracted course, preceeded in some cases by years of precancerous dysphagia.