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The surgeon passes a flexible tube with a telescopic camera through a small cut in the chest. This allows them to examine the lungs under video guidance. They then make 1, 2 or 3 small cuts (incisions) on the side of the chest. They insert the surgical tools through the cuts to carry out the surgery.
During your operation, your surgeon will remove some of the lymph nodes from around the lung. This is because the lymph nodes may contain cancer cells that have broken away from the main cancer. The surgeon sends the lymph nodes to the laboratory where they are examined under a microscope. If the nodes contain cancer cells this may affect the treatment that you need after the surgery.
If you have other health problems such as a severe heart condition or other lung disease, you may not be fit enough to have major lung surgery. Your surgeon will examine you thoroughly and do quite a few tests before you decide together whether an operation is right for you and which type of operation.
Your doctor may recommend radiotherapy instead of surgery.
After surgery for lung cancer, you may wake up in intensive care (ICU) or a high dependency recovery unit (HDU). This is routine after a big operation and as soon as your doctors are sure you are recovering well; you will be moved back to the ward. This is usually within a day of the operation.
To start with, you are likely to have some tubes in place including
You will have regular chest X-rays to make sure you can breathe well. To start with these will probably be done on the ward with a portable X-ray machine.
You will have some pain for the first few days after your operation. There are different types of painkilling drugs you can have and different ways of giving them.
