From the October 2021 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine


“It will be much faster than Intensity-modulated proton therapy and as a result will increase the patient capacity of the treatment room,” said Frederic Genin, president of IBA Proton Therapy North America. “Early research presented by University Medical Center in Groningen showed that head and neck cancers that didn't qualify for proton therapy may now qualify, thanks to proton therapy delivered with DynamicARC.”

The company recently launched a DynamicARC consortium to partner with its key academic accounts to bring the DynamicARC treatment modality to the clinic.


“Our biggest asset is our community of users cumulating more than 250 years of clinical proton therapy experience together,” Genin said.

IBA customers also continue preclinical research on ConformalFLASH therapy, with papers published by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania and other institutions.

“It uses FLASH dose rates as well as the Bragg peak to combine the advantage of both: The conformality and the Flash effect,” said Nicolas Denef, director of emerging therapies at IBA.

Mevion
After a seven-month installation, the Huntsman Cancer Institute in Salt Lake City, Utah, began treating patients with the MEVION S250i Proton Therapy System. Mevion also began installation of the MEVION S250i at Mercy St. Louis and announced the upgrade of the first compact proton system at Barnes-Jewish Hospital to include HYPERSCAN Pencil Beam Scanning and FLASH delivery capabilities.

Mevion is continuing its FLASH proton therapy development, and published a paper on the delivery of FLASH dose rate at any depth with its commercial accelerator, and on the first preclinical results demonstrating the FLASH effect at the Bragg peak. The company believes that FLASH therapy could expand hypofractionated treatments that will further increase utilization and access to proton therapy.

“We are working with our academic partners to explore and demonstrate how to best combine the avoidance benefits of the proton Bragg peak with the FLASH effect, and to do so for all typical cancer indications,” said Townsend Zwart, vice president of advanced development at Mevion.

Mevion is also expanding its global footprint. The first compact proton accelerator was shipped to China at the end of last year, and this year the company joined a multi-institution partnership to establish the first pediatric proton therapy center in China.

Orfit
Last year, Orfit released its Aerial Couch Top for proton therapy. The couch top is attached to a robotic arm, designed to float in the air, so patients can be treated with no obstructions.

October 2021 Magazine

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