Doctors are treating 12 children suffering from eye cancer at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London by a new procedure that is allowing doctors to target tumors with chemotherapy drugs, while avoiding healthy tissues. The procedure involves administering chemotherapy drugs via a catheter passed through a patient’s blood vessels from an incision in the groin to the ophthalmic artery. The technique, called intra-arterial chemotherapy, is at least as effective as standard treatments for retinoblastoma and may even lead to better outcomes.

Researchers are experimenting on a treatment for rare eye cancer, which has already saved some children from vision loss. The US researchers also succeeded in restoring vision in a few cases. The method involved inserting a catheter in the eye via the body so that the chemotherapy drug melphalan, made by GlaxoSmithKline under the name of Alkeran, was administered directly to the tumour.