WWL Louisiana medical reporter Meg Farris aired a segment recently highlighting the ophthalmic brachytherapy program at East Jefferson General Hospital — spotlighting the Liberty Vision treatment option for eye cancer that requires no surgery and is completed in a single visit.

The segment features Dr. Paul Finger, Professor of Ophthalmology at Tulane School of Medicine, Director of Ocular Oncology, and CEO and Chief Medical Officer of Liberty Vision, and his patient Sylvia DeGruy, a 71-year-old retired registered nurse from Ponchatoula who was diagnosed with iris melanoma after a routine follow-up following cataract surgery. In one outpatient visit, with numbing drops and a light sedative, Dr. Finger and his associate Dr. Ankit Tomar treated both of DeGruy’s tumors using the iWand® applicator and LV Y-90 Disc.

“In some cases, like my patient here, we didn’t even have to make an incision. It’s just placed directly over the tumor,” Dr. Finger explained in the segment.

The traditional standard of care for ophthalmic brachytherapy involves surgically suturing a gold plaque containing radioactive seeds to the back of the eyeball, followed by several days of radiation delivery, and a second surgery to remove the plaque. The LV Y-90 system is designed as an integrated, single-session approach, with a dwell time typically measured in minutes. As Dr. Finger described in the segment: “It gives the radiation much more quickly and it’s calculated to give an equivalent amount of radiation as the five to seven days, but typically in 10 to 15 minutes.”

East Jefferson General Hospital, part of LCMC Health and the Tulane academic medical system, is one of only four hospital systems in the country currently offering this treatment approach. The WWL segment also notes that treatment with the iWand® for cancer and benign tumors of the eye is covered by insurance.

Liberty Vision is proud to support the work of Dr. Finger and the entire team at East Jefferson. Expanding access to ophthalmic brachytherapy — to more institutions and more patients — is at the heart of why these devices were designed.

Watch the full WWL Louisiana segment here.

*Liberty Vision does not claim clinical superiority over traditional brachytherapy approaches. The choice of treatment depends on many individual clinical factors and is determined by the treating physician.