Porfimer sodium, sold as Photofrin, is a photosensitizer used in photodynamic therapy and radiation therapy and for palliative treatment of obstructing endobronchial non-small cell lung carcinoma and obstructing esophageal cancer.

Porfimer is a mixture of oligomers formed by ether and ester linkages of up to eight porphyrin units.

[1] In practice, a red light source emitting at 630 nm is used to excite the Porfimer oligomers.

[2] It was approved in Japan in 1994 (for early stage lung cancer?).

[2] It was approved by the U.S. FDA in December 1995 for esophageal cancer, and in 1998, it was approved for the treatment of early non-small cell lung cancer.