Battling Cancer with Precision Radiation Treatments

Steve Adubato goes One-on-One with Dr. David M. Dubin, Chief of Radiation Oncology, Englewood Health, to discuss ways in which physicians can now be more precise in cancer radiation treatment by using stereotactic body radiation therapy.

4/2/19 #2207

Excerpt:

"We're pleased to welcome Doctor David Dubin, Chief of Radiation Oncology at Englewood Health. This is, in fact, part of our ongoing series on the future of healthcare. This part is actually looking at medical technology, medical innovation, and its impact on our lives. Doctor, we were talking, right before we got on the air, about how, when it comes to lung cancer, the technology driving how it's being treated, what we find out, it's critical right now? It's changing dramatically. Talk about it. Yes. It's changing very rapidly, and there's a lot of steps in the process. So first of all, a patient needs to be found out to have lung cancer. In the old days, we found out when the patient was already symptomatic. Now we find out by having patients being screened. So if a person has a certain amount of... a history of lung disease, smoking, they should be speaking to their physicians about getting screened, usually once a year, with a low-dose CAT scan. We're finding, therefore, smaller tumors, and those smaller tumors are easier to cure. Once the tumor is symptomatic, it's very rare that a patient is actually cured. Right. Now, we're finding patients who don't feel anything, and the tumors are small enough that they can either be removed or they can be treated with radiation for cure. But Doctor you also said... you also told me that the way you're treating these tumors is different? It's... In terms of targeting? Is that what you mean? We were able to target moving targets. So... Explain that. Okay. So what's moving? When... every time the patient takes a breath, the tumor is moving. So hold on. So if you're looking at someone's leg, and that person keeps his or her leg still, then the MRI, and then whatever It's relatively still? Exactly. Breathing is different? Breathing is very different. Moves? So we can treat... Moves what? The lungs? The lungs are moving every time we take a deep breath. You know, if you think about it the diaphragm is moving up and down, the lung is moving up and down with it. So how do you target it if it's a moving target? That's the trick. So we're doing a technique called SBRT, which is stereotactic body radiation therapy. Hold on. Back up. Slow down. It's called? Stereotactic body radiation therapy. So that... Is that the Calypso system? Calypso is used within SBRT. Okay. Break it down. Go ahead Okay. So what we are doing, first of all is we have to be able to define where the tumor is at all times. So the patient is breathing up, and then the lung..."