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Varian Medical Systems and BrainLAB announced today the new outpatient high-precision radiosurgery platform Novalis Tx with Adaptive Gating, during a press conference held at the 2009 Arab Health exhibition.

The new Adaptive Gating feature provides non-surgical alternatives to treat lung cancers.

Radiosurgery has become a treatment standard for many brain tumors as an alternative to surgery, in hospitals in the M.E and around the world. The benefits for patients include reduced radiation to the surrounding tissue promising fewer side effects and fewer treatment sessions; often one single appointment is sufficient.

Lung tumours move with each breath, presenting a new challenge to clinicians. Today, radiosurgery techniques formerly used only for the brain can be applied to treat tumors in the body. With Adaptive Gating on the Novalis Tx radiosurgery platform, clinicians can treat lung tumours with high doses. The treatment beam is only turned on when the tumor is in the exact target position needed for treatment. This significantly reduces the radiation toxicity to the surrounding healthy tissue. Novalis Tx has integrated volumetric and real-time imaging capabilities that enable clinicians to detect changes in size and position that have occurred between treatment sessions.

Clinicians also utilise the latest techniques in treatment planning, the Monte Carlo algorithm, to precisely calculate how radiation is distributed across the in-homogenous tissues in the chest cavity in order to get the best treatment outcomes.

Dr Reinhard Wurm, Chairman of the Department of Radiation Oncology at the Klinikum Frankfurt (Oder), Academic Teaching Hospital, Charité-Universitätsmedizin-Berlin, is one of the worldwide renowned experts in radiation treatment of lung tumors and metastases.  With over 20 years of clinical experience in radiosurgery, he has treated more than 5000 patients from allover the world. Further developing the treatment techniques, he has devoted more than six years to the highly precise treatment of body tumours (Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy or SBRT).

“The latest improvements allow us to treat inoperable primary lung cancers as well as metastases originating from other parts of the body with very high precision”, said Dr Wurm.

“We can also offer a combined treatment to patients. This means that surgery is used to remove the parts of the tumour that can easily be reached and the remaining tumour tissue is treated with radiosurgery. This radiosurgery treatment can be done on an outpatient basis, allowing the patient to return home on the same day. Furthermore, chemotherapy can be initiated at the same time to improve treatment response by radio-sensitization and to lose no time to counteract development of distant metastases.”

“Enabling clinicians to deliver a very high dose of radiation precisely to a moving target is a breakthrough. This provides a real alternative and new hope to patients with this disease“, said Jean Hooks, General Manager Oncology Solutions, BrainLAB. “Enhancing cancer prevention programs, earlier diagnosis and innovative technologies will bring more effective changes in patient outcomes today and help the Middle East region prepare for future healthcare challenges.”

In the Middle East, cancer is a leading cause of death along with cardiovascular disease and accidents; lung cancer in specific is one of the five most common cancers among men in this region. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancers worldwide, accounting for 1.4 million deaths each year . While other environmental risk factors exist, smoking has been identified as a main risk factor for developing lung cancer. This cancer often develops roughly 30 years from the onset of smoking. Although the overall lung cancer incidence rate in the M.E region is currently lower than in other regions of the world, the prevalence of smokers has been increasing and experts are expecting a lung cancer epidemic in the coming decades .

Despite the advancements in diagnosis and treatment of many cancers over the past decades, little progress has been made in changing patient outcomes for those diagnosed with lung cancer. The overall five-year survival rate for people diagnosed with lung cancer is lower than 15%. Survival rates vary widely, depending on the stage in which the cancer is detected. Approximately 30% of patients are diagnosed with early stage disease (stage I or II), 20% with stage III disease, and 50% of patients with stage IV disease.

Novalis Tx was released in by Varian Medical Systems and BrainLAB in September 2007. SOme 69 systems are currently being installed or in clinical use at top level medical centers worldwide.

Source: http://www.bi-me.com