by
Gus Iversen, Editor in Chief | November 26, 2014
Overseen by Dr. Arica Hirsch, the protocol will treat 15 to 20 patients with a combination of SBRT and chemotherapy. If successful, the treatment will be available to all of Alliance Oncology's SBRT centers across the U.S.
Enrollment in the protocol was open to colorectal cancer patients of all ages with four or fewer liver metastases, normal liver function, and no metastases in other parts of the body.
Anne Dunlap, Illinois CyberKnife senior site manager, said that although the protocol was originally approved in June, it has gone through updates that the institutional review board is still working to finalize.
Illinois CyberKnife is also working with medical directors throughout the Alliance Oncology network to extend the protocol to other Alliance centers. That would allow them to create a larger database for analysis and comparison.
The first results are expected within the year and full results three to five years from now. Once applied, the updates to the treatment protocol are expected to positively impact patient quality of life and yield optimal treatment outcomes.
Chemotherapy and CyberKnife
St. Louis CyberKnife and SSM Cancer Care in Missouri is also exploring ways to meaningfully combine CyberKnife and chemotherapy. In one case this summer, a patient was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer which had spread to the brain.
The patient's two metastatic brain lesions were effectively treated with CyberKnife. After that, they shrunk the lung tumor with chemotherapy, and the physicians decided to then treat the lung tumor aggressively with four CyberKnife sessions.
Normally, CyberKnife is not a standard option for patients with advanced stage cancer, but by first treating the patient's lung with chemotherapy, the treatment became viable.
That patient's unique case may further demonstrate that by strategically combining two treatment methods, doctors can decrease side effects and overall treatment time for patients experiencing metastatic lung cancer to the brain.
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