New advances in Radiotherapy machine

There are many types of cancer which are treated by radiotherapy. This includes cancer to the prostrate, cervix etc.

Traditionally, radiotherapy has quite a lot of side effect and also not so effective in treating cancer. However, the latest machines are much better, more precise in delivering the radiation to the actual tumour and less side effect to the surrounding tissues.

The old machines uses a 2 dimension system to hit the tumour, which is less accurate and thus they radiotherapist would not be able to deliver higher doses of radiation for fear of damaging the surrounding good tissues.

Then came the newer 3 dimension conformal radiotherapy (3D-CRT) machine which is better as it could help defined the tumour clearly in 3 dimesion form and thus delivering a more accurate treatment to the tumour.

The newer machine is called IMRT (intensity modulated radiation therapy) which is even better, more accurate and precise in the treatment. I have attached a short write-up on what IMRT is below (from Mayo Clinic):

In intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT), very small beams, or beamlets, are aimed at a tumor from many angles. During treatment, the radiation intensity of each beamlet is controlled, and the beam shape changes hundreds of times during each treatment. As a result, the radiation dose bends around important healthy tissues in a way that is impossible with other techniques. Because of the complexity of these motions, physicians use special high-speed computers, treatment-planning software, diagnostic imaging and patient-positioning devices to plan treatments and control the radiation dose during therapy.

So, if you need radiotherapy, please ask your doctor whether the machine is the older 2 dimension, or the 3-dimension CRT or IMRT. Where possible, go for IMRT !