Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT)
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IORT
We use Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT) to treat many different cancers, including breast, ovarian, and colorectal. This cutting-edge treatment uses electron beam radiation to directly treat a tumor bed or residual tumor during surgery.
Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT)
Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA) has added Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT) to its state-of-the-art radiation therapy program. IORT allows patients with a variety of cancer types to receive a single, powerful dose of radiation directly to a tumor site during surgery. This innovative technique helps to reduce treatment times and minimize side effects.
With IORT, our radiation oncologists deliver highly concentrated beams of radiation directly to the tumor bed immediately after tumor removal. This significantly increases the dose of radiation that can be delivered, while also shielding the surrounding healthy tissues and organs.
By delivering the equivalent of several weeks of standard radiation therapy in a single dose and treatment session, IORT helps to improve comfort, convenience and quality of life.
IORT also destroys microscopic tumor cells left behind by surgery, before the cells have a chance to divide or migrate to other areas of the body.
In addition, for patients who need to receive additional radiation therapy after surgery, IORT can be used as a "boost" to treat microscopic disease and shorten treatment time. An IORT boost may be a treatment option for prostate, rectal and gynecologic cancer patients, among others.
A patient must be a surgical candidate in order to be eligible for IORT. Also, this treatment is generally reserved for individuals with early stage disease.
Cancer Types Treated With IORT
At CTCA, Intraoperative Radiation Therapy may be used alone, or in combination with other therapies, to treat patients with a variety of cancer types, including but not limited to:
- Bile Duct
- Breast
- Cervical
- Colon
- Colorectal
- Esophageal
- Gallbladder
- Head & Neck
- Orbital
- Ovarian
- Pancreatic
- Prostate
- Rectal
- Skin
- Soft Tissue Sarcoma
- Tonsil
Radiation Therapy
- 3D Conformal Radiation
- Accelerated Partial Breast Irradiation (APBI)
- BrainLAB SRS
- Calypso® 4D Localization System™
- Contura™
- Cyberknife (see Stereotactic Radiosurgery)
- Deep Tissue Hyperthermia
- External Beam Radiation Therapy (EBRT)
- Gamma Knife (see Stereotactic Radiosurgery)
- High-Dose Rate (HDR) Brachytherapy
- Hyperthermia (also see Local Hyperthermia, Deep Tissue Hyperthermia)
- Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT)
- Image Guided Radiation Therapy (IGRT)
- Intraoperative Radiation Therapy (IORT)
- LightSpeed RT
- Local Hyperthermia
- MammoSite® RTS
- Radioactive Protectants
- Rapid Arc™
- Respiratory Gating
- Radioiodine Ablation (see Systemic Radiation Therapy)
- Stereotactic Radiosurgery (SRS)
- Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy (SBRT)
- Systemic Radiation Therapy
- TheraSphere®
- TomoTherapy® HI-ART
- Total Body Irradiation (TBI)
- Total Marrow Irradiation (TMI)
- Trilogy™
