New specialist targets lung cancer

In Dr. Katarine Egressy’s world, early intervention is the name of the game.

She hit the ground running two months ago as Kalispell Regional Heathcare’s first interventional pulmonologist — and the only pulmonologist with that specialty in a four-state region — doing surgeries and procedures that patients otherwise would have to travel to Salt Lake City or Seattle to find the same kind of expertise.

Bronchial thermoplasty is one of the procedures new to Kalispell area patients. Targeted at patients with severe asthma, the procedure reduces the airway smooth muscle, allowing asthmatics to breathe easier.

“It reduces the number of ER visits and other treatment and allows for a much better quality of life,” Egressy said.

Joyce Emmert of Columbia Falls was one of Egressy’s first patients here. A month ago she underwent a rigid bronchoscopy with bronchial dilation, a procedure to stretch her airway that was scarred and nearly closed off.

“She was kind of an angel in disguise,” Emmert said about Egressy. “I had to have surgery and I was supposed to have it quite some time before I did. I could have gone to Seattle but I didn’t want to do that. Lo and behold I didn’t have to go there because she came into the area.”

In addition to these specialized procedures, much of Egressy’s work focuses on early diagnosis of lung cancer. Instead of a lung biopsy that requires major surgery, she can perform a minimally invasive procedure that can detect lung cancer and determine where it has spread.

A native of Ukraine, Egressy emigrated to the United States with her family when she was 11. She got her undergraduate degree in biology and German literature from Duke University and completed medical school at Columbia University. Egressy earned her Master of Public Health from the University of Valencia in Spain.

Her clinical training covered a wide swath of medical facilities, including general surgery training at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, an internal medicine residency at Providence St. Vincent’s Medical Center in Portland, a pulmonary/critical care fellowship at the University of Wisconsin and most recently as an interventional pulmonary/research fellow at the University of Chicago.

Egressy has board certification in pulmonology, internal medicine and critical care.

As Egressy delved into pulmonary care, she gravitated toward procedures to detect lung cancer.

“I felt a great need to address lung cancer diagnosis in a less invasive way that would allow early diagnosis,” she said.

Egressy points out that lung cancer takes more lives than prostate, breast and colon cancers combined. While there have been effective national campaigns for breast and colon cancer awareness, the same is not true for lung cancer.

“With lung cancer there is the attitude that it is something you bring upon yourself by a history of smoking,” she said.

Fifteen percent of people who develop lung cancer are nonsmokers.

About half of the lung cancer diagnosed already has spread and is classified as Stage 3. That’s a statistic Egressy is determined to affect with earlier intervention.

“We can be more aggressive and rule out cancer earlier,” she stressed.

About 118,000 people are diagnosed with lung cancer each year in the United States and the five-year survival rate is only 16 percent.

Egressy recently traveled to Libby to consult with doctors at the Center for Asbestos Related Disease. That clinic has thousands of patients suffering from lung disease linked to asbestos exposure from the former vermiculite mine there. Egressy already has a half-dozen referrals from the Libby clinic.

“With me being here, [Libby] patients don’t have to go to Salt Lake City or Seattle” for treatment.

One of Egressy’s goals when she accepted the position at Kalispell Regional was to start a comprehensive lung cancer screening program. That program will begin in March and is expected to be an American College of Radiology-accredited site for lung cancer screening.

Earlier this year the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “stepped on board” to pay for lung cancer screening with a low dose computed tomography, Egressy pointed out. She also noted that a federal task force and the National Cancer Care Network recommend having a comprehensive system in place to counsel patients and provide correct diagnostic pathways for those screened for lung cancer.

“The greatest worry is that people will fall through the cracks,” she said.

It was Kalispell Regional Healthcare’s philosophy of creating a medical home for both its staff and patients that appealed to Egressy.

“The thing that keeps us moving forward is the understanding we’re providing care to patients who become part of our extended family,” she said. “It’s very clear this community can benefit from services like this. Rural communities should have the same standard of care” as urban areas.

“I’ve always felt I wanted to practice in communities that are underserved in pulmonology,” she added.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com