A University of Texas medical-research team has pioneered a new attack on cancerous tumors by using computed-tomography scans -- or CT scans -- to guide a precise robotic arm.
Researchers from the San Antonio Cancer Therapy & Research Center and the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio recently performed the first two brachytherapy treatments using a special stereotactic arm.
Brachytherapy is a minimally invasive procedure that involves attacking a malignant tumor by placing "seeds" of radioactive material directly inside it. The arm places the seeds in precise locations mapped out by surgeons.
"It's pseudo real time. That is, we put the patient in a CT scanner in an immobilization device, and at the same time we pre-plan the brachy implants," said James Havezi, director of medical physics at the Cancer Therapy and Research Center.
The CT scanner produces a precise image that surgeons rely on to guide them during later surgery. An ovarian-cancer patient was treated last month, and on Friday the surgeons performed the therapy on a lung tumor.
About one week prior to the surgery, technicians take a CT scan of the patient and plan the points at which they want to deliver the brachytherapy.
On the day of the surgery, the doctors manually guide a stereotactic arm along the patient's skin while watching its simulated path with a computerized 3-D multiplanar reformation, or MPR, picture.
"As long as the positions are correct, the simulation is the same as what you would see if you put the patient back in the scanner," Havezi said.
