MCH Surgeons with Sentinel Node Seeker Submitted by David Stallworth, M.D. F.A.C.S. General/Vascular Surgery A major technical advance was offered to Monroe County Hospital last week. Through the generosity of the Monroe Health Foundation, a new General Electric NodeSeeker was purchased for the operating room. This device allows precise identification of very early cancer spread (the Sentinel Node). Once identified, the node can be removed with a very small incision to provide information which in the past would have required a major surgical procedure, such as removing all the lymph nodes under the arm for breast cancer. This allows our patients to be treated as outpatients with much less pain and very short recovery times from the surgery. Patients who undergo this type of procedure can then begin further therapy, if indicated, in a matter of days, not weeks. Also, they are able to resume normal activities in two to three days. Combined with lumpectomy, this new device allows many breast cancer patients to have all their surgery done as an outpatient, without general anesthesia, at MCH. Radiation therapy can then be performed at the Southwest Alabama Community Cancer Center, a center made possible through donations to the Monroe Health Foundation. Less than two years ago, Monroe Countians would have been asked to go to a major metropolitan area for a period of six to eight weeks to receive this type of advanced, minimally invasive care. In conjunction with our pathologists and radiologists, the Department of Surgery at Monroe County Hospital is proud to offer truly state of the art care to people with breast cancers and melanomas, as well as a number of benign conditions such as hyperparathyroidism. This broadens further the range of minimally invasive surgery which is available at MCH and marks the greatest revolution in modern surgery since the advent of antibiotics in the 1940’s. A GE Medical Representative, while demonstrating the new equipment to the MCH staff, noted that identical machines had been purchased recently by Atlanta Medical Center, Emory Medical Center, Duke University Medical Center and the Naval Air Station Hospital in Pensacola. The Gordon Ross Cancer Center in Birmingham is considering purchase of this newest generation of Node Seeker. When asked, the representative stated that no other community hospital in Alabama, Georgia, eastern Tennessee or the western Carolinas have such capability. It is truly a testament to the commitment of donors to the Monroe Health Foundation to provide the best and latest advances to the people in this area. Funds from the Foundation’s recent “Motown Madness” made this equipment donation possible.