State-of-the-Art Radiation Treatments at Halifax Health Center for Oncology
Halifax Health offers many options for the treatment of cancer. Selecting the appropriate treatment depends on an individual patient's preference and the guidance from his or her physicians.
IGRT (Image Guided Radiation Therapy)
As patients'organs are continuously moving due to breathing, swallowing and other involuntary motion, so are tumors. This motion can result in the radiation beam missing its target. The most advanced method to correct for this motion is IGRT. IGRT enables doctors to monitor the spatial location of the tumor during radiation treatment. This makes it possible to minimize the volume of healthy tissue exposed to radiation during treatment.
IMRT (Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy)
IMRT delivers high dose radiation to malignant tissue (cancer cells) while providing the lowest possible dose to the surrounding normal organs. This method provides for much better targeting of cancer cells than conventional radiotherapy. By having increased control over the dose and being able to deliver higher radiation doses to cancer cells, physicians can prevent surrounding healthy tissue from being damaged. IMRT can be used to treat tumors that might have been considered untreatable in the past due to close proximity of vital organs and structures.
Brachytherapy
Brachytherapy, also called Internal Radiation Therapy places the radiation source as close as possible to the cancer cells. Radioactive material, sealed in a thin wire, catheter, or tube, is placed directly into the affected tissue. This method concentrates the radiation on the cancer cells and minimizes the radiation damage to the normal tissue nearby. This method is commonly used to treat localized prostate cancer, cervical cancer and cancers of the head and neck.
Implanted radiation sources may be either temporary or permanent. In the former case, the radioactive material is placed inside or near a tumor for a specific amount of time and then withdrawn. Temporary brachytherapy can be administered at a low-dose rate (LDR) or high-dose rate (HDR). In contrast, in the case of permanent implant, the implanted radiation source is left in the patient. Radioactive seeds used to treat prostate cancer is an example of permanent implant.
SAVI™
Watch Our Video! SAVI Treatment for Breast Cancer at Halifax Health
Halifax Health is proud to offer SAVI™, a breast brachytherapy applicator that is the latest advance in the delivery of radiation therapy for early-stage breast cancer. SAVI uses multiple catheters to precisely target radiation where it is needed most, while minimizing exposure to healthy areas, like the skin or chest wall. SAVI treatments are normally delivered twice a day over a 5-day course.
Mammosite breast treatments
In treatments with MammoSite 5-Day Targeted Radiation Therapy a radiation source is placed inside the lumpectomy cavity (the space left when a tumor is removed). The source delivers radiation to the area where cancer is most likely to recur.
Stereotactic Radiosurgery
There are two types:
- Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) refers to a single exposure or shot of radiation to effectively "remove" a region or volume of the body.
- Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) refers to stereotactic targeting or radiation therapy to a point outside the skull.
SRS and SBRT are non-surgical procedures that use highly focused x-rays to treat certain types of tumors, inoperable lesions and as a post-operative treatment to kill remaining cancer cells. Halifax Health is the exclusive source for SRS and SBRT in the area. SRS involves a multi-disciplinary team with specialties in radiation oncology, neurosurgery, neuroradiology and radiation physics and offers new hope to patients with inoperable brain tumors, some benign conditions and a wide variety of vascular malformations. The advantage of SRS/SBRT is it delivers the right amount of radiation to the cancer in a shorter amount of time than traditional treatments. Plus the treatment is delivered with extreme accuracy, minimizing the effect on nearby organs.
