The field of cancer treatment is currently being revolutionized by the development of new and exciting technological methods of fighting tumors and minimizing the negative effects of radiation therapies. Since the late 1800s, doctors have been using radiation to treat cancer, ever since the discovery that X-rays could remove damaging tissue and stop or slow the growth of tumors. However, even with the use of sophisticated methods of delivering X-rays, gamma rays, or other kinds of radiation, patients still stuffer significant side effects, as radiation therapies have often lacked the precision to target tumors or other damaging tissues without affecting surrounding healthy organs.
Today, however, many researchers on the cutting edge of science are developing new methods of improving cancer treatments to make radiation therapies safer, less invasive, and less disruptive to a patient’s quality of life. One of the ways that this is being done is through improving imaging techniques to precisely locate the margins of tumors and aim radiation beams at them in a way that allows treatment to be more accurate and precise, and have less of an effect on surrounding tissues. Rafael Manon, a radiation oncologist at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Orlando, FL, is one of the leading researchers in this field of oncological imaging, and has recently been exploring and publishing adaptive radiotherapy, which promises to reduce the incidence of side effects and allow for greater precision in treating head, neck, lung, and gynecologic cancers.
Another recent advance in cancer treatment is the development of proton treatment centers, one of which will soon be installed at Rafael Manon’s home base, the MD Anderson Cacner Center. In proton therapy, particle accelerators create a beam of protons that can destroy tumors effectively with minimal scattering of radiation energy, meaning that tissues surrounding tumors receive far lower doses of radiation than the targeted tumors do. As a result of its precision, tumors that are extremely close to vital organs can be attacked without the same harmful effect on healthy tissue that traditional radiation therapy would have.
