Firefly Lights Up Operating Room

Technology is lighting the way for surgeons during delicate operations, and a surgeon in Columbus is one of the first in the world to use it.

It's called "Firefly" technology, and is a special dye injected into the patient that causes a bright green fluorescence of certain tissues. The dye shows doctors where the healthy tissue ends and a tumor begins.

Dr. Ronney Abaza, the Director of Robotic Surgery at Dublin Methodist Hospital is using Firefly in the operating room. In November, he used it to remove a mass the size of a golf ball from a patient's kidney.

Surgeons can also use a little switch to toggle back and forth between the white and flourescent lights to help them be more precise.

"That's essentially the ideal situation, that we see the bright green flourescence of the kidney," Dr. Abaza said. "You can see without that flourescence it's hard to tell where the edge of the tumor is compared to where the normal kidney is."

One of the best parts is that patient - Frank Gordish - got to keep 80 percent of his kidney. "I only lost part of the kidney. The part that needed to come out," Gordish said.

To view the story by ABC6/FOX28’s Terri Sullivan, click here.