Language: English
This service contains links to third party websites. EPG Patient Direct is not in a position to verify this information and cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of the content contained.
13 Aug 2008
Targeted radiation therapy can remove all evidence of disease in selected patients who have cancer which has only spread to a few sites in their body, the first report from an ongoing trial suggests.
Published in the August 15th issue of Clinical Cancer Research, the study by researchers from the University of Chicago Medical Centre reports that all signs of cancer were completely controlled in 21 per cent of patients who had five or fewer sites of metastatic disease.
Metastasis is the spread of a disease from one organ to another non-adjacent organ.
Each patient in the study received three doses of precisely-targeted radiation therapy which was focused on each metastatic tumour and treatment was usually completed in one week.
Some six of the 29 initial patients had lasting tumour control, with no detectable evidence of disease 15 months after the treatment, Eurekalert notes.
"We now have about 50 patients and several of them remain disease-free, one of them three years after treatment," senior author Dr Ralph Weichselbaum.
The trial is continuing.
Radiation therapy uses ionising radiation to kill cancer cells and shrink tumours.
More health news
Delicious
Reddit
Facebook
StumbleUpon
