'Single-shot' treatment excites cancer experts
Monday March 29 2010
PIONEERING treatment for breast cancer that cuts a six-week course of tumour-destroying therapy to a single half-hour "shot" is showing success in early trials in patients, according to British doctors.
The radiotherapy treatment, which is for use in patients with early breast cancer after they have undergone surgery on the tumour, is designed to kill cancerous cells with a concentrated beam of radiation.
At present, breast cancer sufferers undergo a five to six-week course of radiotherapy treatment after surgery, involving about 20 hospital visits. Doctors hope that, after the publication of trial data later this year, a single dose of intra-operative radiation therapy (IORT) might become more widely available.
The procedure involves lowering a small spherical applicator into the tumour during surgery. This then gives out a uniform dose of low energy X-rays directly to the tumour bed.
A phase III clinical trial has involved 77 patients in Britain, Germany and Australia who underwent tumour excision followed by IORT. Only two patients have experienced local recurrence of their cancer. . (© The Times, London)
- Sam Lister in London
Irish Independent
