Radiation Oncology
Radiation Oncology
Patients needing radiation are treated with equipment from the most trusted manufacturer in the industry with the Varian TrueBeam Radiation Therapy Linear Accelerator, equipped with On-Board Imaging and 3D Cone-Beam CT for Image-Guided Radiation Therapy (IGRT). This equipment allows the team to very accurately align the patient and treat with radiation beams from multiple angles to focus dose to the desired treatment volumes while minimizing dose to surrounding tissue and organs. The use of Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT) allows for additional conformity of the radiation dose to achieve highly conformal irradiated volumes and additional sparing of other tissue and organs.
The center’s Siemens Somatom GoSim CT Therapy Simulator is custom-designed to replicate patient position and imaging as they will be treated on the linear accelerator. Varian’s Eclipse treatment planning software uses this information to create and calculate the individualized radiation plans for each patient.
Systemic radiation therapy uses radioactive drugs (called radiopharmaceuticals or radionuclides) to treat certain types of cancer, including thyroid, bone, and prostate cancer. These are liquid drugs made up of a radioactive substance. They can be given by mouth or put into a vein; they then travel throughout the body.
SBRT Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), also called stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SaBR), is used to treat tumors outside of the brain and spine. It accurately delivers very high doses of radiation to the tumor in few treatments (one to five) while limiting the impact on nearby healthy tissue.
IMRT Intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) is able to protect the normal, healthy tissue and the critical tissues around the tumor so that your physician can deliver a high dose of radiation more precisely to the cancer and minimize side effects from the treatment. IMRT treatments can be used to cure cancer (typically occurring every day Monday-Friday for six to nine weeks) or to treat symptoms from the cancer (usually shorter in duration, anywhere from once to every day for two to three weeks), also called palliative treatment.
IMRT is highly personalized to the patient’s needs and anatomy. Just like surgery, outcomes from this therapy greatly depend on physician experience and close attention to dose and volumes of the treated tissues. UK’s radiation oncologists are highly experienced in IMRT, and they specialize in complex cases, including patients who have had previous radiation therapy or surgeries and those with other complicated medical issues.
3D CRT Conventional/3D-conformal radiation therapy Conventional/3D-conformal radiation therapy delivers radiation treatments every Monday through Friday, typically for two to six weeks. This type of radiation directs the appropriate dose of radiation to the cancer, while using detailed imaging and block design to spare the surrounding healthy tissue.
Respiratory Gating is an innovative process that uses advanced computer software to guide the delivery of radiation as a patient breathes. A tumor can sometimes move during treatment, especially if it is located in an area of the body that naturally moves as a result of respiration, such as lungs, chest, or abdomen.
