Montclair Hospital Launches New Radiologic Therapy To Treat Tumors

MONTCLAIR, NJ — A hospital in Montclair has launched a new radiologic therapy to treat patients with neuroendocrine tumors, it recently announced.

Hackensack Meridian Mountainside Medical Center has been licensed by the state health department to perform a radiation treatment called peptide receptor radionuclide therapy (PPRT) using the drug Lutathera for adults with advanced, cancerous neuroendocrine tumors that develop in gastrointestinal tract and pancreas.

The drug is FDA-approved and has been used to treat patients since 2018, hospital administrators said.

It is estimated that more than 12,000 people in the U.S. are diagnosed with a neuroendocrine tumor (NETs) annually, and the number of people diagnosed with this type of tumor has increased. This is thought to be attributed to improvements in testing, diagnostics and increased awareness of these tumors, hospital spokespeople said.

According to the hospital:

“The drug is administered by intravenous (IV) infusion between eight weeks and 16-weeks apart. A full course of therapy consists of four doses. Different from most cancer medicines, Lutathera specifically targets and enters cells with somatostatin receptors - such as those found in the neuroendocrine tumors in the gut - and their neighboring cells. Treatment takes place in a specially designated treatment room in the hospital’s Infusion Center. Anti-nausea medicine, and amino acids are also given to protect the patients’ kidneys from radiation.”

“I’m excited that Mountainside received licensure to administer PPRT treatment,” said Brett Lewis, medical director of radiation oncology at Mountainside.

“Bringing the latest, targeted cancer therapies to the hospital means that our local community does not need to travel out of the area to receive the advanced care they need,” Lewis said.

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