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If experience is your main metric in choosing where to get cancer surgery, Geisinger Wyoming Valley tops the list in most of 11 cases, according to a new report.
				The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council released a short report listed the number of cancer-related surgeries performed at hospitals throughout the state from June 2018 to June 2019. The surgeries reviewed were bladder, brain, breast, colon, esophagus, liver,lung, pancreas, prostate, rectum and stomach.
				Luzerne County&rsquo;s three hospitals in the report were Geisinger Wyoming Valley, Wilkes-Barre General, and Lehigh Valley Hazleton. It&rsquo;s worth pointing out the the Hazleton hospital often refers serious cases to Lehigh Valley Allentown, which has a much higher count of surgeries for most of the cancers reviewed.
				That said, Geisinger Wyoming Valley had more surgeries in all but two of the types of cancer, and even in those two it was close. In some cases, Geisinger had done more surgeries than the other two combined.
				Lehigh Valley Hazleton and Wilkes-Barre General had no surgeries for the esophagus or liver. Geisinger only had one for the former but 20 for the latter. Lehigh Valley also had no brain surgeries, while Wilkes-Barre General had 3 and Geisinger had 35. Lehigh Valley Hazleton also had no surgeries for the pancreas, while Wilkes-Barre General had one pancreas and Geisinger Wyoming Valley had 4.
				Wilkes-Barre General had the highest number of prostate cancer surgeries, 18 compared to 15 at Geisinger Wyoming Valley and none at Lehigh Valley Hazleton. Wilkes-Barre General also had the highest number of stomach cancer surgeries, five compared to four at Geisinger and one at Lehigh Valley Hazleton.
				Geisinger&rsquo;s biggest difference was in breast cancer, where it performed 134 surgeries compared to 59 for Wilkes-Barre General and seven for Lehigh Valley Hazleton.
				The numbers matter, according to a media release accompanying the report, because &ldquo;There is strong evidence in the scientific literature that links hospital surgical volume and patient outcomes for the cancer surgeries included in this report. In other words, patients requiring one of these 11 surgeries are likely to have better results if their surgery is performed at a higher volume hospital.&rdquo;
				But the release also warns &ldquo;volume data should not be used in isolation when making conclusions about hospital quality since many other factors such as patient level of sickness (stage of cancer) or surgeon experience may also contribute to the overall outcome.&rdquo;

Report: Geisinger Wyoming Valley leads area in cancer surgeries