Interstitial brachytherapy is a safer, non-invasive method used to deliver efficient doses of radiation to treat localized aggressive cancers such as prostate and endometrial cancer.
What it is
Interstitial brachytherapy uses radioactive material placed directly into or near a tumor to kill tumor cells. In anatomy, interstitial indicated the area between the cells of a structure or part. Placing the radiation treatment directly in contact with or as close to the growth as possible, is less invasive than other procedures, allows a lower dose to be used and reduces damage to surrounding healthy cells and tissue.
How it Works
Brachytherapy is a form of radiotherapy in which the source of irradiation is placed close to the tumor or inside a body cavity. In interstitial brachytherapy, the radioactive source is delivered directly inside the tumor by hollow needles, seeds or wires and may be used alone or with external beam radiation. The radioactive source may be permanently implanted, removed after the required dose or repeated as necessary. The most common types of cancer indicated for this treatment include early stage prostate cancer and penile cancer. Radiation oncologists also use several types of brachytherapy for the treatment of cervical, endometrial and bile duct cancers as well as soft tissue sarcomas. It is less commonly used to treat breast cancer and cancers of the head, neck, lung and esophagus.
Benefits
Benefits include allowing a larger, focused dose which increases the likelihood of destroying the tumour in a less invasive way. For example in treatment of the prostate, only the organ and a small margin around it is affected, similar to the area that would be removed by a surgeon in a more invasive prostatectomy. Interstitial brachytherapy also has a therapeutic advantage over general external radiation, which damages other cells in a greater area. It is becoming the best choice of treatment for aggressive organ-confined prostate cancer (that has not spread to other parts of the body). In most cases the patient is able to avoid radical treatment such as surgery and chemotherapy.
Newer methods to implant the radiation sources have improved brachytherapy, focus the treatment where it is needed and make it a good choice for localized therapy. Other types of cancer are also being treated with this method; a recent study demonstrated that patients with ocular melanoma (cancer in the eye) treated with interstitial brachytherapy avoided the removal of the eye.