New technique lets doctors target tumours (From Echo)

New technique lets doctors target tumours

10:00am Monday 13th September 2010 in News By Katy Islip

CANCER patients at Southend Hospital are the first in the county to benefit from a revolutionary new treatment technique.

The hospital is the first in the UK to use intensity modulated radiation therapy, known as IMRT, which can produce individually-tailored radiation doses which wrap around tumours exactly.

Conventional radiation treatments deliver doses in straight lines, but as tumours are often irregular shapes the new treatment means they can be comprehensively treated while avoiding potential damage to nearby healthy tissue.

Clinical oncology consultant Dr Imtiaz Ahmed, who carries out many of the procedures, said: “It is like painting with the dose.

“With IMRT, we are able to target the precise shape of the tumour rather than treating the entire area. We can programme the machine to modulate the intensity of radiation during the treatment.”

The pioneering treatment means cancers in vulnerable places, such as the head and neck, can be accurately pinpointed while avoiding other organs such as the salivary glands or the spinal cord.

Using CT images, clinicians calculate where irradiation is most needed and tailor doses to suit the patient’s needs, and a specialist machine helps shape the precise focus and intensity of the radiation beam as treatment is delivered.

Consultant clinical scientist, James Green, said: “All the professions involved here at the hospital made a huge effort to get it up and running. Although the complexity of the procedure means it can take longer to outlines the target area, there are huge advantages in terms of more accurate treatment, fewer side effects and shorter course of treatment.”

The care offered is soon to get even more sophisticated after the hospital used charitable donations to invest in volume moderated arc therapy, which allows the machine delivering treatment to rotate around the patient. This will shrink treatment time from 15 minutes to just two minutes.