About Cyberknife

 In some ways cyberknife is similar to surgery, hence the name. As mentioned by other forum members, the problem with both is that you can’t (usually) be sure that you take out all the tumor cells. You eliminate a visible mass or masses, but it’s enough if some cells (even one cancerous stem cell) remain in place. So you need some other technology that kills all of these bastards, wherever they are located, in the vicinity or further away. Fortunately (if one can say that) the NPC and other H&N tumor have a more locoregional spread (at least in the initial stages), meaning that even in stages III and IVA the tumor cells are located in the H&N area, so they can be eliminated by rads delivered in that region (and of course, chemo). Having said that, you could use (hypothetically) surgery, cyberknife, radiation and chemo altogether. Surgery is not usually done for NPC (except for selected cases, because there are here vital organs that can be easily affected); cyberknife doesn’t have this disadvantage, but the radiation (IMRT) kills the cells in the region anyway, would be redundant (and would also add the risks associated with the procedure).

CyberKnife is a very targeted type of radiation which ablates the tumor rather than removing the tumor by giving doses high enough to kill the cancer in 1 to 5 treatments. CyberKnife treats from up to 1200 diferent angles where conventional radiation therapy equipment aims the beam in an arc rotation of 0 to 360 degrees the CyberKnife is mounted on a robotic arm that moves much like your arm so 1200 angles are achieved. The radiation treatment on CyberKnife is delivered in about 150 different angles while conventional radiation equipment treats in 6 to 8 angles. CyberKnife uses doses of 600 cGy to 2000 cGy per treatment while conventional radiation is given in 180 cGy to 200 cGy per treatment.

The reason H&N patients don't get CyberKnife treatments is that they usually have disease in the lymph nodes of the neck so they need treatment to a larger field or area. If for some reason the tumor is not controlled with conventional radiation therapy or chemo and the tumor returns then the patient could get CyberKnife treatment to that recurrence. That is the real beauty of CyberKnife being able to treat areas such as the spine, lung, brain that have already received the maximum amount of treatment with conventional radiation. This is achieved by limiting dose to critical structures like spinal cord, brainstem or bowel while delivering ablative doses to the tumor.

Many patients that would have had no other options now have CyberKnife to keep them going.

Hope this helps.

Good Luck!

Isabel8 said:

Hi thank you all for your

Hi thank you all for your replies, you guys are very knowledgeable.

Hi phrannie, I'm glad your having a smooth recovery, I read that you used Mugard during treatment to help with mouth sores, do you think that's the main reason why your able to cope better? This product is not available in my country though.

 

Yep, it killed the spot on my lung after 2 chemos and rads but still a new spot showed up. About to have a follow up at the end of March. Wish me luck!