Fifteen years follow up after studying 223 patients with localized prostate cancer showed that radioactive seed implants are a highly effective treatment in combination with conventional external beam radiation.Seed implants, also called brachytherapy, are small radioactive pellets about the size of a grain of rice. The pellets are implanted into the prostate; they deliver radiation to the prostate cancer from the inside.

Most good-prognosis patients who choose seed implants do not receive other treatments. Patients with more aggressive tumors may get seed implants plus external beam radiation.

Three out of four patients in the study remained disease free at least 15 years after treatment ended. It is not clear from the study if the patients would have fared equally well with either the seed implants or external-bean radiation therapy alone, however they are confident the combined therapy is very effective in treating prostate cancer.

Esophagitis is a condition that happens when the esophagus is inflamed and can cause pain and discomfort when swallowing. This is a common side effect when treated with radiation to the chest and neck area and can also be caused by chemotherapy treatments.

Some ways to help deal with the symptoms of esophagitis:

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Farrah Fawcett has been battling anal cancer for six weeks now and is two-thirds of the way through an intensive six-week regimen of chemotherapy and radiation.

Fawcett, 59, has been enduring radiation therapy five days per week since October 13 and is taking the side effects — fatigue, nausea, sleeplessness, and pain — in stride. Fortunately, she has a strong support network that includes Ryan O’Neal, her son Redmond, her father James, and most recently — Charlie’s Angels.

On November 1, Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson joined Fawcett at her Beverly Hills condominium and did what they say they’ve been doing ever since finding fame and friendship on Charlie’s Angels 30 years ago. They talked and laughed and gossiped and ate. Just like old times.

Doctors say Fawcett is responding well to treatment as she charges forward. With a little help from her friends — and angels

According to the European researchers, simple radiation treatment combined to chemotherapy after lung cancer surgery can double the survival time for patients with cancer that hasn’t yet spread through the body.

The patients had stage 3 lung cancer, which has spread to lymph nodes outside the lung but not throughout the body. Such patients often have the visible tumors removed and then get chemotherapy, too, to delay any further spread.

Dr. Jean-Yves Douillard, professor and head of medical oncology at Centre Rene Gouducheau, Nantes, France said, “In this study 47 patients with lung cancer survived for at least five years”. Dr. Douillard and colleagues in Italy and Spain tested 840 lung cancer patients, of whom 232 agreed to extra radiation treatment. The treatment doubled survival for some, but not all of the patients, Douillard told a meeting of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology in Philadelphia.

He added “This is the first time that a clinical trial has examined the effectiveness of radiation after surgery for lung cancer”

“The results show that radiation treatment should be considered for resected (surgically treated) non-small cell lung cancer with involved mediastinal lymph nodes in addition to chemotherapy.”

Douillard said that, just because the triple combination of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation works in some cancer patients, for other patients that kind of treatment may be too much therapy.

Lung cancer is the world’s biggest cancer killer, taking the lives of 95 percent of its victims. It kills 1.3 million people globally every year — more than 160,000 in the United States alone.

Because lung cancer rarely causes symptoms until it has spread, most people are not diagnosed until it is too late, and surgery, chemotherapy and radiation can only extend their lives for a few months or years.

Results from the largest study of men with prostate cancer treated with high-dose, intensity modulated radiation (IMRT) show that 89 percent of men were disease free eight years later. Patients were treated at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and classified into prognostic risk groups. After an average of eight years, 89 percent of the men in the favorable risk group were disease-free and none of the men in any group developed secondary cancers as a result of the radiation treatments.This report, published in the October 2006 issue of The Journal of Urology, is the first description of long term outcomes for prostate cancer patients using IMRT. Intensity modulated radiation is an improved form of three-dimensional conformal radiation (3D-CRT). IMRT uses enhanced planning treatment software that more precisely targets the prostate, allowing the beam of radiation to deliver a high dose to the tumor target while sparing the adjacent bladder and rectum from exposure to the higher amounts of radiation.

Dr. Michael J. Zelefsky, Chief of the Brachytherapy Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering, said “This study confirms that we can improve patients’ quality of life by reducing the side effects of radiotherapy while maintaining disease-free survival.”

Rosemont Mayor Donald E. Stephens is one of the nation’s longest-serving mayors. Stephens, 78, announced on Thursday, that he has undergone surgery for stomach cancer and hopes to return to work soon. Doctors operated on Stephens in May at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge.

The northwest suburban mayor said he finished radiation treatments about two weeks ago and anticipates a full recovery. Stephens’s condition has been kept as a secret. He has had a series of health issues in the last nine months. Last December, he underwent triple-bypass surgery. In May, he missed his village’s 50th anniversary gala because of another health problem before his cancer surgery.

“I’m tired. The radiation knocks the socks out of you,” Stephens said. “Other than that, I’m doing just fine.” “I just didn’t want all this sympathy,” Stephens explained when asked why his condition was kept secret.

Modern three-dimensional radiation therapy is more successful at curing lung cancer than older two-dimensional radiation therapy for some patients with early stage lung cancer, according to a report in the September 1, 2006 edition of the International Journal of Radiation Oncology • Biology • Physics.

Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for seven out of eight lung cancers diagnosed, and the best treatment for stage I NSCLC currently is surgery or stereotactic radiation therapy (SRT), often followed by chemotherapy.

The five-year survival outcomes are very high, with 50 to 67 percent of these patients living at least five years. When surgery is not an option because the patient has heart problems or other complications, treatment options include varying types of radiation therapy and chemotherapy, alone or in combination.

In this study, doctors at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston wanted to see if conventional radiation therapy worked as well as the newer three-dimensional conformal radiation therapy (also called 3D-CRT) at curing patients with early stage non-small cell lung cancer.

3D-CRT was created to improve upon older types of radiation therapy by allowing doctors to aim several radiation beams at the tumor to shape or “conform” the radiation to the lung. The idea is that tailoring each beam allows doctors to give more radiation to the tumor while keeping it away from nearby healthy tissues.

Between 1978 and 2003, 200 patients with medically inoperable stage I NSCLC were treated with radiation therapy alone. Eighty-five received 3D-CRT while 115 received conventional therapy.

Thirty-six percent of patients who received 3D-CRT lived five years after diagnosis compared to 10 percent who received the conventional therapy. Their causes of deaths were more related to intercurrent disease rather than cancer. Local failure was significantly reduced by 3D-CRT compared to conventional RT.

“This study proves that three-dimensional conformal radiation therapy improves outcomes for patients with medically inoperable stage I non-small cell lung cancer,” said Dr. Ritsuko Komaki. “Patients with this type of lung cancer should ask their radiation oncologist about 3D-CRT.”

Source: 2Breathe

MORRISVILLE, N.C. – Sicel Technologies has signed on two cancer centers in Florida as the first commercial users of their implantable radiation sensor technology.

Boca Raton Community Hospital’s Lynn Cancer Institute and Melbourne Internal  Medical Associates will use Sicel’s Dose Verification System as part of their treatment programs. The system includes an implantable radiation sensor and a hand-held reader to measure the dose of radiation delivered to a tumor and surrounding tissue.

Sicel recently closed on $12 million in new financing. The company, which was founded in 1999, now employs 31 people.

“Radiation oncologists will now know with certainty that a patient is receiving the correct dose of radiation,” said Tim Williams, chair of the radiation oncology department at Lynn Regional Cancer Center. “This is just one example of our hospital’s commitment to staying on the edge of technology and investing in what is best for the patient.”

The Food and Drug Administration recently approved the DVS for use in breast cancer and prostate cancer victims. Shortly after winning the FDA approvals, Sicel closed on the additional financing.

“Both Lynn Cancer Institute and MIMA have a history of providing the best care for their cancer patients by being among the first centers to adopt cutting edge technologies,” said Michael Riddle, Sicel’s chief technology officer. “We are extremely pleased to have two such prestigious institutions as our first users in the United States.”
Sicel utilizes technology licensed from North Carolina State University.

Source: WRAL Local Tech Wire