Treatment for Cancer

Cancer has a number of distinctive types of external radiation beam therapies. These treatment options are used for specific cancer types according to the recommendations and judgments of the concerned radiation oncologists.

Types of Treatment for Cancer:

3D-CRT or Three-Dimensional Conformal Radiation Therapy:
This therapy uses unique imaging techniques and computers to show the location, shape and size of tumors that usually originate in various sizes and shapes. These 3-dimensional representations of tumors and their surrounding organs enable radiation oncologists to tailor the radiation beams according to the shape and size of the tumors with precision. This tailoring is possible with custom-fabricated field-shaping blocks or multi-leaf collimators. The surrounding normal tissues get less radiation and are able to heal rapidly as the radiation beams are directed towards tumor/s with extreme precision.

IMRT or Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy:
This is a specialized version of 3D-CRT that enables radiation to be more precisely and exactly shaped to fit the tumor/s. The radiation beam can be dismantled into multiple beam-lets with IMRT, and it is also possible to, individually adjust the intensity of every beam-let.

Radiation oncologists also use IGRT or image-guided radiation therapy that helps in a better delivery of radiation to the cancer as tumors can shift between treatments owing to movements during breathing or differences in organ filling.