Helios Emil von Behring: Esophageal cancer cured in an 88-year-old patient

When you see Dieter Damm, you wouldn't think that he had been on the operating table less than ten days earlier and had survived a challenging operation: He is fit and dynamic and enjoys talking about himself and his life. He has Prof. Dr. Marc H. Jansen, Head Physician at the Clinic for General, Visceral and Minimally Invasive Surgery, to thank for this. Together with his team, he freed the 88-year-old from his oesophageal cancer during a seven-hour minimally invasive and robot-assisted procedure.

Esophageal cancer is quite rare. Only around 10 in 100,000 people are diagnosed with this form of cancer every year, and it mainly affects men. The Clinic for General, Visceral and Minimally Invasive Surgery at Helios Hospital Emil von Behring is one of the few clinics in Berlin that treat esophageal cancer. Dieter Damm, who has lost 15 kilos in weight over the past few months because his swallowing difficulties were getting worse and he had to vomit a lot of food, has now also benefited from this expertise. The doctors treating him provided certainty: the 88-year-old has a tumor which, to put it simply, is located between the oesophagus and stomach (cardia carcinoma AEG II). Only a complex surgical procedure can help, which is not performed in many clinics due to the location of the tumor.

Standard procedures according to Ivor Lewis are only available at a few clinics in Berlin

Dieter Damm came to Berlin-Zehlendorf to see Prof. Dr. Marc H. Jansen. Surgeon Jansen explains: 

"We performed a minimally invasive and robot-assisted two-cavity procedure on Mr. Damm. We operated successively in the abdomen and chest to remove part of the stomach with lymph nodes and part of the esophagus with lymph nodes at the junction between the esophagus and stomach. This is a standard procedure according to Ivor Lewis, which is only performed in a few clinics."

The Clinic for General, Visceral and Minimally Invasive Surgery can perform this challenging procedure in "only" around seven to eight hours. Other clinics need up to 12 hours for this operation. This speaks for the expertise at the site and is also gentler on patients like Dieter Damm.

If you ask the 88-year-old about the procedure, he is full of admiration for the surgeon and the technology: 

"I'm a former graduate engineer. I think it's very good that Prof. Jansen used the surgical robot for my operation. Together with the robot, the human being has ensured that I can continue to live. I am very grateful for this, because my 'enemy', the cancer, has been driven away."

Lewis esophagectomy

The operation begins in the abdominal cavity with the patient lying on their back. Here, with the help of the da Vinci surgical robot, the lower esophagus is dissected and the tumor and surrounding lymph nodes on the esophagus and stomach are removed. The patient is then placed in the left lateral position as part of the same procedure and the operation is continued in the chest cavity, where a stomach tube is formed from the residual stomach and pulled up intrathoracically (gastric pull-up) and connected to the upper oesophagus.

Read more:

• About Helios Hospital Emil von Behring
• About Prof. Dr. med. Marc Jansen

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