Latest cancer treatments get even better - CyberKnife® and IRIS

As Britain’s first CyberKnife® Centre at The Harley Street Clinic gets ready to treat its 100th cancerAbnormal, uncontrolled cell division resulting in a malignant tumour that may invade surrounding tissues or spread to distant parts of the body. patient, the revolutionary robotic radiotherapyThe treatment of disease using radiation. machine has achieved a new first by treating a cancer patient using a special moving IRIS system which allows finer control and even faster treatment.

As described, CyberKnife® is a revolutionary machine that can treat cancers that were previously either impossible or highly difficult to treat.  It has a linear accelerator mounted on a very manoeuvrable robot arm which enables highly accurate pencil thin beams of radiationEnergy in the form of waves or particles, including radio waves, X-rays and gamma rays. to target tumours from every angle.  Its special guidance system allows the machine to move with the breathing of the patient and thus it can destroy tumours with sub millimetre accuracy.

The new IRIS system can vary the aperture of the linear accelerator between pulses of radiation thereby speeding up the treatment and giving greater control. The first patient to be treated using the new IRIS system was a lady with rectalRelating to the rectum, the lowest part of the bowel leading to the anus. cancer.  Her oncologistA specialist in the treatment of cancer. is Dr Andrew Gaya, one of the pioneers of CyberKnife® treatment in the UK said:  “This is an extremely useful new accessory for CyberKnife® which gives us greater flexibility in treating certain patients,” he said.  “Treatment plans are more complex and the IRIS system allows us to deliver more radiation in a shorter time to particularly odd shaped tumours and thus reduces still further the risk of damaging healthy tissueA group of cells with a similar structure and a specialised function..”