Lung Cancer 'Sniper' Surgery: Langkai Medical's Electromagnetic Navigation System Tackles Early-Stage Lung Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment

Recently, lung cancer, the world’s leading cause of cancer-related deaths, may have encountered some new challenges.

Lung Cancer: The “Top Dog” of the Cancer World, Rampant and Deadly. According to the “Global Cancer Statistics 2018” published in the official journal of the American Cancer Society, the global incidence rate of lung cancer was 11.6% and the mortality rate was 18.4% in 2018, maintaining its position as the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide.

Yet even this “demon” has its Achilles’ heel—early diagnosis and treatment.

As the most formidable among the many “demons” of cancer, lung cancer naturally faces widespread efforts to combat it. Recently, a domestic startup has mastered a unique expertise in tackling lung cancer by focusing on early diagnosis and treatment: a bronchoscope placement navigation system. This system is compatible with all models of bronchoscopes and can precisely locate bronchial lesions within minutes. Compared with imported products, it allows patients to undergo the procedure without general anesthesia, thereby minimizing clinical risks to the greatest extent.

This company is Langkai Medical.

Suzhou Langkai Medical Technology Co., Ltd. was founded in 2012. Its independently developed bronchoscope placement navigation system delivers comprehensive clinical capabilities, ranging from CT data acquisition and 3D bronchial tree reconstruction to preoperative lesion localization and path planning, intraoperative real-time navigation, and postoperative case analysis.

Lung cancer has earned its notorious reputation as a formidable “cancer killer” largely due to the highly favorable growth environment provided by its precursor, pulmonary nodules. Early-stage small pulmonary nodules primarily occur in the peripheral regions of the lungs, where bronchi are densely packed and have narrow diameters, making them inaccessible to conventional bronchoscopy. Consequently, early biopsy—the most effective approach for combating cancer—is often rendered ineffective by the difficulty of obtaining adequate samples. As a result, 80% of lung cancer patients in China are diagnosed at an advanced stage, with a five-year survival rate of less than 15%.

In an exclusive interview with VCBeat, Dr. Yi Xin, founder of Langkai Medical, stated that early screening, early diagnosis, and early treatment (collectively referred to as the “Three Earlies”) are currently the most effective medical approaches for combating lung cancer. Through electromagnetic navigation, physicians can accurately reach the lesion, establish a pathway, and perform interventional procedures. This approach avoids the harm associated with blind treatments and reduces surgical time.

He also stated that precision minimally invasive interventional techniques constitute the technological foundation and future direction of surgical procedures. However, due to the complex structure and extensive branching of the lungs, performing early peripheral lung biopsies is challenging, and patients may still face the trauma of open-thorax surgery during early-stage treatment. In recent years, with advancements in modern medicine, CT imaging technology and Rapid On-Site Evaluation (ROSE) cytopathology have become increasingly mature. When integrated with bronchoscopic navigation systems, these innovations have made precision minimally invasive diagnosis and treatment of early-stage lung cancer possible.

Following the optimal path preoperatively planned, Professor He Jianxing, under the guidance of an electromagnetic navigation system, maneuvered the electromagnetic navigation bronchoscope to gradually approach the patient’s bronchial lesion. After more than ten minutes, the bronchoscope and sheath accurately and rapidly reached the target lesion under the guidance of the electromagnetic navigation system. The targets were two 6-mm nodules located in the lower lobes of both lungs. The next step involved marking with the fluorescent agent indocyanine green (ICG) in conjunction with fluorescence thoracoscopy. Within moments, the target nodules were resected. With the completion of the closing procedures, the surgery was successfully concluded.

This surgery was performed last October by Professor He Jianxing, the First Dean of the Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, and his team. It marked China’s first tubeless, subxiphoid single-port electromagnetic navigation-guided concurrent bilateral pulmonary nodule resection. Guided by the planning and real-time navigation of the electromagnetic system, the procedure was carried out with precision and minimal invasiveness, allowing the patient to get out of bed and walk freely just six hours after surgery.

In his postoperative commentary, Professor He stated that, with electromagnetic navigation localization, the distinct features of this procedure compared to traditional surgery are reflected in the following aspects:

Dr. Yi Xin told VCBeat that in traditional procedures, when conventional bronchoscopes cannot reach the complex peripheral lung regions, a guide sheath (GS) is generally used in an attempt to access the lesion site. However, since the GS itself provides no optical imaging information, additional X-rays are required for localization, which results in prolonged radiation exposure for both physicians and patients.

Another approach to open-chest diagnosis and treatment typically requires the removal of a significant amount of lung tissue from the patient, sometimes even an entire lobe. This "using a cannon to kill a mosquito" style of diagnosis and treatment causes considerable damage to the patient's physical functions. Moreover, it is not uncommon for patients to undergo open-chest biopsy only to find that no cancerous lesions are present.

Dr. Yi Xin stated that, beyond technological breakthroughs, he places greater emphasis on the clinical experience.

“The technology itself is not difficult; the challenge lies in its commercialization,” said Dr. Yi Xin. Compared with imported counterparts, Langkai Medical’s electromagnetic navigation system offers several unique advantages in clinical practice: First, it is compatible with all bronchoscope models currently available on the market. Second, it can precisely locate bronchial lesions within minutes, whereas similar foreign products typically require approximately 20 minutes for this step. Third, patients need only local anesthesia during the procedure, while current foreign products still require general anesthesia.

“Electromagnetic navigation technology has been on the market for a relatively short time. When it comes to high-end medical devices, many people still hold the belief that ‘foreign products are inherently superior to domestic ones.’” Dr. Yi Xin stated that this perception is gradually shifting in certain fields, with some domestic products now capable of competing head-to-head with their international counterparts, and even holding certain advantages. Breaking the entrenched stereotypes within the industry regarding domestic high-end medical devices is the much-anticipated positive change currently expected by the sector.