HERLEV, Denmark /PRNewswire/ -- A leading Danish cancer hospital has treated its first patient using RapidArc® radiotherapy after installing eight advanced radiotherapy treatment machines from Varian Medical Systems (NYSE: VAR) of Palo Alto, California. Herlev Hospital, to the north-west of Copenhagen, delivered the fast and efficient RapidArc treatment to a prostate cancer patient using a Clinac® iX linear accelerator.

The treatment comes just two years after the hospital selected Varian to replace its entire treatment machine and software infrastructure because the equipment was unable to carry out advanced image-guided treatments. "We are delighted with the rapidity of implementation," says Poul Geertsen, head of radiotherapy at Herlev Hospital. "The transition from our previous equipment to an overall Varian solution has been smooth and has enabled us to be among the first hospitals in Europe to offer RapidArc treatments."

"All our treatment personnel were pleased with the speed and ease of the first treatment and the patient responded well," adds Brian Holch Kristensen, chief physicist. "We now have RapidArc capability on six of our eight linear accelerators and we hope to soon routinely carry out more prostate treatments before expanding our RapidArc program to include other pelvic and head & neck treatments."
RapidArc delivers a precise and efficient treatment in single or multiple arcs of the treatment machine around the patient and makes it possible to deliver image-guided IMRT times two to eight times faster than is possible with conventional IMRT. Faster treatments allow for greater precision, since there is less chance of patient or tumor movement during treatment delivery and, with less time on the treatment couch, also allow for greater patient comfort.

"Without any previous experience with RapidArc we successfully treated the first patient within two weeks of the RapidArc installation," adds David Sjostrom, deputy chief physicist. "In order to routinely replace today's standard IMRT treatments with RapidArc for all treatment sites, we now need to strengthen our collaboration with Varian and other RapidArc users. In the future, we are hoping RapidArc will prove to be the best choice of treatment both in terms of delivery time and quality."

Herlev Hospital carries out 48,000 radiation treatments per annum, treating 3,000 new patients each year. All eight Varian accelerators at Herlev, ordered in May 2007, are equipped with the On-Board Imager® device for modern, real-time image guidance, which is integral to RapidArc treatments. IGRT enables clinicians to pinpoint the position of the tumor at the time of treatment, allowing more precise treatments and potentially fewer side effects.

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