Doctors at the UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas say cryosurgery is a treatment option for liver cancer patients who can't be treated by more traditional surgical approaches. These patients include those who have multiple liver tumors, those whose tumors are near major blood vessels and those whose condition makes liver resection especially risky.
Surgeons use ultrasound to guide a probe through the liver to the tumor.
They use liquid nitrogen to chill the probe tip to nearly 400 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. The probe kills the tumor by freezing it. The dead tumor is then eventually absorbed into the surrounding tissue. This is a very localized treatment, so there is little damage to surrounding tissues. There also is less blood loss with this procedure than with traditional liver surgery.