Q: what is radiation therapy?
A: radiation therapy, referred to as "radiation", commonly known as the North: "people tend to diathermy, radiotherapy and chemotherapy and radiation shooting confused. Radiation therapy is the treatment of malignant tumors (occasionally benign diseases) by means of ionizing radiation of radiation. History of clinical application of radiation therapy has been 100 years, 1895 roentgen discovered X-ray in 1898, Mrs. Curie discovered natural radioactive elements radium, humans began to use radiation to treat disease history. After more than 100 years of development, formed the external irradiation technique for radiation therapy to the remote medical electron linear accelerator; and the radioactive particles permanently or temporarily into a patient a radiation ray irradiation in brachytherapy technique.
Q: the difference between radiotherapy and chemotherapy
A: speaking of tumor treatment, the doctor will say need chemotherapy, people often get confused in radiotherapy and chemotherapy, radiotherapy and chemotherapy are two different treatment methods: radiotherapy is a local treatment, is the use of radiation to kill cancer cells, can be used alone or with surgery in the treatment of local tumor and prevent local tumor recurrence. Chemotherapy is a systemic treatment that uses chemicals to inject and take orally, and then spread the whole body through the blood system to kill tumor cells and prevent the spread of tumors. Therefore, the relationship between radiotherapy and chemotherapy is the relationship between point and plane, and the relationship between the two part and the whole. Only by planning and systematically arranging the procedures of radiotherapy, chemotherapy and surgery can the best curative effect be achieved.
Q: do those tumors need radiotherapy?
A: according to clinical data from western countries, about 60% of cancer patients need radiotherapy. The clinical data show that only about 28% of the cancer patients have received radiation therapy, and there is still a big gap between the developed countries and the advanced countries. According to the standard of clinical treatment, many tumor patients need radiotherapy at some stages of treatment to cure the tumor, reduce the local recurrence rate of the tumor or relieve the symptoms caused by tumor compression and metastasis. For example: the NPC must take radiotherapy treatment to achieve cure; early laryngeal cancer and cervical cancer surgery can achieve the same curative effect by radiotherapy alone; locally advanced rectal cancer by preoperative radiotherapy and chemotherapy can improve the resection rate. However, many hospitals do not have radiotherapy, and many clinicians do not understand the knowledge about tumor radiotherapy. As a result, many cancer patients do not receive radiation advice from the doctor concerned. At present, the treatment of malignant tumor has the standard of treatment, it is suggested that the tumor patients can consult the radiotherapy department and have the indication of radiotherapy.
Q: what new radiotherapy techniques are available in the clinic?
A: over the past 20 years, with the development of computer technology and nuclear technology, radiotherapy equipment has developed rapidly. With CT simulation, localization becomes routine, and three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy has become the basic treatment technique of radiotherapy. The development of the two kinds of technology on this basis: the first is the IMRT: the so-called IMRT is trying to improve the tumor target radiation dose, to ensure the normal tissue within normal tolerance. The disadvantage of this technique is that each treatment takes a long time. Recently, a rotational intensity modulation technique has been developed to shorten the duration of each treatment while maintaining the efficacy of the IMRT technique. The second category is stereotactic radiosurgery, which is often referred to as X (gamma) - knife, characterized by a large dose of radiation, a shorter number of days of treatment, only 1-5 days on it. Based on the above treatment technology, but also the development of image-guided radiotherapy, is on the accelerator with a flat CT, do a CT image verification in each treatment to ensure the accuracy of each radiation (like the missile before launch, first with the radar scan, ensure the missile hit rate). In addition, some devices can be added to control and reduce the effects of respiratory movement on the treatment, known as respiratory gating. This year, the Radiotherapy Department of Shanghai Third People's hospital has introduced a complete set of advanced international radiotherapy systems, which can complete these new radiotherapy technologies.
Q: are now commonly referred to as gamma knife and proton and heavy ion therapy better than conventional radiotherapy?
A: now the so-called "gamma knife" and "X- knife" are commonly used in society. Compared with conventional radiotherapy, it is a type of radiotherapy with high dosage and less treatment (1-5 times). For small, curable tumors. At present, the United States in the use of this technology for the treatment of early lung cancer, 1-3 years of efficacy follow-up is no less than the effect of surgical treatment, is still in clinical trials. Foreign call this technology as "surgery radiotherapy technology", is a kind of special form and radiotherapy, can not replace conventional radiotherapy, radiotherapy, many have this "surgery radiotherapy" ability, because the current radiotherapy of many tumors without a mature program, therefore less clinical application. It is recommended that patients or their families go to the regular hospital for consultation with the radiotherapy department and choose which kind of radiotherapy is beneficial to themselves.
The alternative radiation technique now developed uses no photons, but protons and other heavy ions as a therapeutic beam. It has the advantage of being good for tumors that are insensitive to the photon line. The disadvantage is that the equipment is very expensive, are in a separate trial stage, the product is not mass production, the efficacy of most tumors is superior to conventional radiotherapy, there is no clinical